
CARr r ..: 






o 



u 








UNDER THE ABSOLUTE AMIR 




AMIR HABIBULLAH KHAN. 



[Frontispiece. 



UNDER 
THE ABSOLUTE AMIR 



FRANK A. MARTIN 

y^ 

FOR EIGHT YEABS ENGINEER-IN-CHIEF SUCCESSIVELY TO THE AMIES ABDUR 

RAHMAN AND HABIBULLAH, AND FOR THE GREATER PART OF THAT 

PERIOD THE ONLY ENGLISHMAN IN KABUL 



Illustrated by the Authors Drawings and Photographs, 
and by other Photographs 




LONDON AND NEW YORK 

HARPER & BROTHERS 

45 ALBEMARLE STREET, W. 
1907 



JDS3.5A 




CARPI; 



CONTENTS 

CHAPTER I 

ON THE ROAD 

PAGE 

Order of march Soldiers and guards Method of carrying goods by 
pack animals Description of camps Marches Welcome 
given to Sirdar Nasrullah at villages and cities Description of 
country passed through Kandahar Amir and the monllah 
who took refuge in the Kandahar Sanctuary 1 

CHAPTER II 

ON THE ROAD continued 

Method of fishing in the rivers Route through Khilat and Mukur to 
Ghazni and distance from Kandahar Cold and snow on journey 
Ghazni Robberies and murders on roads before Amir Abdnr 
Rahman's time Villages and cultivation en route Arrival in 
Kabul and reception of Sirdar Nasrullah by Amir 16 

CHAPTER III 
KABUL 

The Mihman . khana or Guest-house Description of hamams 
(Turkish baths) Description of people met with on roads and 
streets Amir Abdur Rahman Description of palace and 
audience chamber, and his reception of me Situation of Kabul 
and description of country around Kabul city, its bazars, 
streets, and filth Water-supply and drainage systems Sanitary 
arrangements Pariah dogs and crows scavenging city ... 33 

CHAPTER IV 

KABUL continued 

How streets are governed City magistrate Robberies and murders 
Bazar shops Style of palaces and better-class houses 
Climate of Kabul 47 

V 

Sw^or* 
i 



Contents 

CHAPTER V 

MANNERS AND CUSTOMS 

PAGE 

Belief in the supernatural Dress of men Complexion Character 
of people Description of various tribes Languages and 
schools Feuds between families How holidays are spent by 
the people Singing and musical instruments Games and 
amusements 58 

CHAPTER VI 

MANNERS AND CUSTOMS continued 

Superstitions, fairies, and devils A curious legend Astrologers 
Children singing prayers on roofs to avert calamity Different 
foods in use Smoking and tobacco The Amir's chief physician 
Snuff Method of keeping warm in winter How time is 
kept Weddings of different classes Funerals 78 

CHAPTER VII 

AMIR ABDUR RAHMAN 

Form of government Abuse of authority Amir's food and drinking 
water and taster Soldiers and horses always ready for flight 
Amir's habits Amir's amusements, attendants, etc. Amir's 
feelings towards England Amir's views on Afridi rising and 
Boer War Amir's stratagem 98 

CHAPTER VIII 

AMIR ABDUR RAHMAN continued 

Amir's sons and his treatment of them Princes and their duties 
and durbars Food supplied by Government to members of 
royal family How officials are paid Civil and Military titles- 
Court life and officials Law courts Amir's lingering illness, 
death, and burial Rumours of rising Fears of populace 
Burial of household treasures Plots to get body Coronation 
of Amir Habibullah New Amir's promises of Reform 
Amusements 120 

CHAPTER IX 

PRISONS AND PRISONERS 

Kotwal and Kotwali (magistrate and police court) Policemen as 
thieves Description of prisons Description of how prisoners 

vi 



Contents 

PAGE 

are treated and their irons The old well in Bala Hisar The 
spy system Cutting a man's throat False reporting Fanah 
(wedge) tortures 142 

CHAPTER X 

TORTURES AND METHODS OF EXECUTION 

Amir's iron rule Hanging by hair and skinning alive Beating to 
death with sticks Cutting men in pieces Throwing down 
mountain-side Starving to death in cages Boiling woman to 
soup and man drinking it before execution Punishment by 
exposure and starvation Scaffold scenes Burying alive 
Throwing into soap boilers Cutting off hands Blinding 
Tying to bent trees and disrupting Blowing from guns 
Hanging, etc 157 

CHAPTER XI 

LIFE OF EUROPEANS IN KABUL 

Life hi Kabul Houses and gardens Guards and danger from 

" Ghazis " Allowances given wives Servants and swindling, 173 

CHAPTER XII 

LIFE OF EUROPEANS IN KABUL continued 

Lawlessness Food: Kaising cattle, sheep, fowls, etc. Presents 
from princes and others Famines in Kabul Cholera 
Moullah's pilgrimage and preaching Use of roofs of houses- 
Work and working hours Amusements Hindu dealers and 
old curios Festival visits to Amir and princes Europeans 
tried by jury Letters, cost of postage Interpreters .... 192 

CHAPTER XIII 

SOLDIERS AND ARMS 

Clothing Reviews Drill Uniforms of Amir's bodyguard Arms 
Pay Medals Length of service Substitutes Barracks 
Mode of life Gambling among soldiers Different tribes form- 
ing regiments Thief tribe and regiment Officers and pro- 
motion Bands Afghan anecdotes of incidents during war, 
1879-81 Afghan army as a fighting machine Condition of 
country for warfare Illustration of one side of Afghan cha- 
racter 213 

vii 



Contents 

CHAPTER XIV 
TRADES AND COMMERCE 

PAGE 

Amir's interest in mechanical tools, guns, etc. Workshops Con- 
sumption of fuel Ustads and workmen Pay of men Trades, 
shopkeepers, and merchants Produce of country Exports 
and imports Irrigation of crops and fights about water Cara- 
vans and methods of carrying freight Weights and measures 
Mirzas and offices Debt collecting Hindoos and Hindoo 
money-lenders Mint and coinage of country 229 

CHAPTER XV 

GEOLOGICAL CONDITIONS OF THE COUNTRY 

Kabul valley once crater of volcano Earthquakes Kabul once 
a large lake Mines outcropping, gold, lead, copper, coal, etc. 
Rivers, and gold in them Existence of kept secret for fear 
of trouble Turkestan mines The question of fuel for Kabul 
workshops Local supply exhausted Coal under the valley of 
Kabul 254 

CHAPTER XVI 

RELIGION 

Suni and Shiah Moullahs and their influence on the people Jihads 
or holy wars The Koran Late Amir's distrust of Moullahs 
Holy men, fakirs, and holy graves Madmen and reverence 
paid them as God-stricken Sayid and Hafiz Beggars and 
alms Stoning to death for religious offences Prayers Punish- 
ments for not knowing prayers Musjids Ramazan and fast- 
ings Haj Afghan colony in Australia Lawful and unlawful 
food Plurality of wives 266 

CHAPTER XVII 

POLITICAL SITUATION 

Amir's policy in killing off leading men of country to ensure his 
son's reign Dwindling revenue Why Amir could not meet 
Lord Curzon in India Russian encroachment on frontier 
Russian influence in Kabul Afghanistan a menace to Russian 
approach towards India Afghan rule cheapest means of keep- 
ing unruly tribes in order Policy to keep the Afghans well 

viii 



Contents 

PAGE 

armed Sympathy with English justice and government 
Influence of British Agent on the people Why railways are 
not wanted in Afghanistan Reason rich mines are left un- 
worked Seaboard wanted by Amu: on Beloochistan coast 
Internal policy of Amir Abdur Rahman 289 

CHAPTER XVIII 

ROAD FROM KABUL TO PESHAWAR 

Difficulty of getting permission to enter Afghanistan and to leave it 
Description of country passed through Camping-places on 
way down and distances Description of Jelalabad City 
Usbeg horseback game of Buz-bazee Kabul river at Jelalabad 
and beyond The musak Summer heat The last day's 
journey 308 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 

TO FACE PAGE 

AMIK HABIBULLAH KHAN Frontispiece 

THE SHAHZADA ON THE MARCH FROM KANDAHAR TO KABUL . . 8 

(From a drawing by the Author) 

SIRDAR MAHOMED OMAR KHAN AND STAFF 24 

AMIR ABDUR RAHMAN IN EVERYDAY DURBAR. SIRDAR HABI- 
BULLAH (PRESENT AMIR) SITTING WITH HIM 40 

(From a drawing by the Author) 

THE MmMAN KHANA (GUEST-HOUSE), KABUL 48 

PORTION OF GARDEN ATTACHED TO MY HOUSE SAINT'S GRAVE 

IN THE CORNER OF GARDEN 48 

GROUP OF AFGHAN GUARDS AND SERVANTS TAKEN IN COMPOUND 

OF MY HOUSE KITCHEN AT THE BACK 80 

MARRIAGE PARTY OF THE " UPPER TEN." BRIDE AND WAITING- 
WOMEN CARRIED IN LITTERS 88 

(From a drawing by the Author) 

MARRIAGE PARTY OF POORER CLASS BRIDEGROOM AND BRIDE 

FOLLOWED BY GlRL CARRYING THE BRIDE'S CLOTHES ... 96 
(From a, drawing by the Author) 

AMIR ABDUR RAHMAN AND OFFICIALS AT DINNER 104 

(From a drawing by the Author) 

PRINCE INIATULLAH ELDEST SON OF AMIR HABIBULLAH KHAN 

AND STAFF 120 

xi 



List of Illustrations 



TO FACE PAGE 

AMIR ABDUR RAHMAN KHAN 128 

KABULI WOMAN'S INDOOR DRESS 200 

NEW PORTION OF KABUL WORKSHOPS, WITH THE SIRDAR'S 

BUNGALOW AND OFFICE IN CENTRE 232 

SOLDIERS ON GUARD IN GARDEN OUTSIDE THE KABUL WORK- 
SHOPS EATING FOOD 240 

(From a drawing by the Author 

GROUP OF KABUL MIRZAS (WRITERS, OR CLERKS) 248 

THE SERAI AT INGDALAK, ON THE ROAD FROM KABUL TO 

PESHAWAR . 312 



Xll 



UNDER THE ABSOLUTE 
AMIR 

CHAPTER I 

ON THE ROAD 

Order of march Soldiers and guards Method of carrying goods by pack 
animals Description of camps Marches Welcome given to Sirdar 
Nasrullah at villages and cities Description of country passed 
through Kandahar Amir and the moullah who took refuge in the 
Kandahar Sanctuary. 

IN the summer of 1895 the Afghan prince, Shahzada 
Nasrullah Khan, was the guest of the English 
Government for three or four months, and he had 
been entertained and feted and generally made much 
of while his visit lasted, and his return journey had 
been made pleasant by a stay in Paris, Eome, and 
Naples before going on by sea to Karachi and thence 
by rail to Chaman, the railway terminus close to the 
Afghan frontier on the Quetta side of Beloochistan. 

The Shahzada was met and entertained at the 
railway terminus by General Sir J. Brown, command- 
ing the Quetta district, with other officers and 
officials, and afterwards rode on to his camp across 
the border, where he was joined by a multitude of 
troops and followers, who had been sent by the Amir 
to accompany him on his further journey. 



Under the Absolute Amir 

I had accompanied the Shahzada, as he was 
commonly called in England, on his return from 
London, and rode with him through Kandahar to 
Kabul, and when he set out from his camp early 
the following day I formed one of his retinue. It 
was near the end of October and late in the season, 
but the day we started was a very hot one, and grew 
hotter as we went on, and the multitude of horsemen 
who accompanied the prince caused clouds of dust 
to rise as they rode along and made it still more 
sultry and oppressive. 

The country looked very desolate and inhospitable, 
for on all sides stretched a large undulating sandy 
plain, bare of vegetation, save a few tufts of coarse 
grass here and there, and rocks jutting out of the 
plain in places, while in the distance were bare foot- 
hills and barren rocky mountains, and over all the 
sun threw its burning rays until the sand and rocks 
seemed to give out as much heat as the sun itself. 
There is no made road from Chaman to Kandahar, 
nothing but a track worn into the earth by the pass- 
ing of caravans from time immemorial, and at places 
on the side of the track were the bones of horses and 
camels whitening where they had fallen. The prince 
and his retinue, however, rode along cheerfully, for 
they had returned safely through all the dangers 
of foreign travel and had many tales of strange 
lands and stranger customs to tell their relations 
and friends when they got to Kabul, and had 
brought with them finely wrought produce of these 



On the Road 

lands to make presents of and to trade with and 
reap much profit. 

In front of the Shahzada were two long lines, 
wide apart, of Usbeg Lancers. At an interval on 
either side of him, and following the Usbegs, were 
two other lines of the bodyguard, the Eissalah 
Shahi, armed with sword and carbine, and better 
uniformed than the others, and following these were 
troops of sowars who were roughly dressed and 
wild-looking, though not so wild-looking as the 
Usbegs with their sheepskin busbies, the hair of 
which falls about their faces and makes them look 
wilder than nature made them. The sowars' mode 
of keeping line would, perhaps, have offended a 
military eye, but they nevertheless looked very 
serviceable in case of need. 

Before all rode a man with a native drum 
strapped to the saddle in front of him, which he 
kept continuously tapping in time to his horse's 
hoof beats ; this is the custom used to signify the 
approach of a royal personage when travelling. 

Beside the prince ran a man carrying a huge 
gold embroidered umbrella, as a protection from the 
scorching rays of the sun, and around him were syces 
and foot guards, while a little in front were other syces 
leading spare horses. Behind rode attendants and 
the Khans and chiefs who were accompanying him, 
and I rode with these and knew what it was like 
to ride in a cloud of dust which caked the perspira- 
tion on one's face and was so dense that the horses 

3 



Under the Absolute Amir 



stumbled over stones in the road they were unable 
to see. 

Along the track, and stretching away into the 
distance, both before and behind, were strings of 
camels and pack-horses, each with its own dust- 
cloud and accompanied 4 by their drivers, who were 
on foot. These carried the tents and baggage of 
this small army, and with each string of animals 
was a sowar, or trooper, whose duty it was to see 
that there was no undue delay on the road and to 
ensure the full load reaching the next camp, for 
most of the pack animals were the property of men 
who make a trade of carrying goods, and these men 
are not averse to making a little extra profit when 
opportunity offers. 

It was with a feeling of thankfulness that I heard 
the prince order a halt for tea soon after midday, 
for my mouth was parched with heat and dust. We 
all dismounted by the side of a hillock, and seated 
ourselves on the stones and rocks round about while 
tea was prepared ; excepting, of course, attendants 
and soldiers, who are not supposed to feel fatigue. 
After drinking tea the prince offered me a cigarette, 
and I may mention that he showed me many courtesies 
and kindnesses on the journey and ordered fur-lined 
overcoats to be made for me by his tailors, saying 
that English coats were unsuitable for the extreme 
cold we should afterwards experience, and I appre- 
ciated his thoughtfulness in this very thoroughly 
afterwards. The Shahzada was a different being in 



On the Road 

his own country, not at all like the Afghan Prince in 
London. 

After a short rest the march was resumed and 
continued until camp was reached. The afternoon's 
ride was more pleasant, for the heat was less, and, 
the track running over harder ground, the dust was 
not quite so much in evidence. 

At all of the villages we passed the inhabitants 
were crowded outside the walls to see the Shahzada 
and his people, while the head men of the village 
stood in front of the others, and, as the prince came 
up, took off their turbans with both hands, and prayed 
for him and his safe journey. Outside most of the 
villages long poles were fixed in the ground on either 
side of the track, with a string stretching across from 
top to top, and from the centre of the string the 
Koran was suspended, wrapped in cloths. The prince 
and his followers, when passing under the Koran, 
stretched up their right hands and touched it, and 
then with that hand touched each of their eyes, their 
mouths, and hearts, saying a short prayer the while. 
After this the Shahzada would stop for a time and 
talk with the head men of the village, and then ride 
on. Two or three bands accompanied the party, and 
on the prince's arrival at each camping- ground they 
played the royal salute as he rode in (this was also 
done when leaving). At each camp also a large 
shamiana was ready, and there he would hold durb ar, 
which all the chief men of the country round about 
attended, either to salaam the prince or to receive 

5 



Under the Absolute Amir 

payment for the provisions and forage supplied to 
the men sent on in advance to prepare everything 
against his coming. 

At many of the places stopped at were men 
who had come to meet those friends or relations who 
had been to England, but it was at Chaman that the 
Afghans first got news of their relatives. When first 
meeting a friend they embrace three times, first to the 
right, then to the left, and then to the right again, 
after which streams of question and answer follow. 
It was touching to see the eager questions after the 
triple embrace, and to see some turn away crying, 
possibly at the news of the death of a relative, or it 
may have been that they were overcome at meeting 
with friend or relative. 

While superintending the unloading of baggage 
from the goods train at the Chaman terminus, before 
crossing the frontier, I noticed the Kotwal, one of 
the prince's staif who accompanied him on his visit to 
England, sitting on some boxes and looking very 
glum. He knew sufficient Urdu to carry on a con- 
versation, and so I asked what troubled him. He 
sighed, and said that he had just heard that his 
brother in Kabul had been made prisoner, and now 
his own enemies may their fathers be cursed ! had 
taken advantage of his brother's downfall to poison 
the Amir's mind against him, and he was told that if 
he returned to Kabul it was probable the Amir would 
kill him. So he had thought it over, and concluded 
that it was better he should go back to Karachi and 

6 



On the Road 

stay there with some friends until he could return 
with safety, and he asked me to help him in getting 
away by the next train. 

To help in the running away of one of the chief 
officials of Kabul would have been a bad introduction 
for me to the Amir, and it seemed hard not to help a 
man to escape death, as he said, and he knew the 
Amir's ways ; so, saying I would think it over and 
make inquiries about the trains, I left him, wondering 
how best to arrange the difficulty. I ascertained that 
there would be no train before nightfall, and at that 
time we were due at the Afghan camp across the 
frontier, so, as there was no necessity to take 
immediate steps in the matter, I went on with the 
work in hand. 

At lunch time the English-speaking native, who 
had charge of the catering and other arrangements in 
connection with the prince's reception at Chaman, 
came to tell me that the Kotwal had also approached 
him about running away, and what should he do ? I 
recognized that there was no help at hand, and so I 
impressed on him that whatever was done nothing 
must be known that we were concerned in the man's 
running away, pointing out the bad impression it 
would make on the Amir, and that the Government 
would no doubt institute inquiries and we should be 
blamed. So he went off, and came back with the 
Kotwal, and for a long time talked to him in Persian, 
of which I had little knowledge then, and, I believe, 
persuaded him that it was better that he should go 

7 



Under the Absolute Amir 

away that day to the Afghan camp, and get back 
during the night, or the following day, and he would 
leave one of his men to see him to Karachi. How- 
ever, when I rode away that evening the Kotwal 
rode with me, and we reached the Afghan camp to- 
gether, and he was one of the prince's retinue when 
we set out next day on the road to Kandahar. 

Afterwards, although the prince received orders in 
Kandahar that he should be brought back to Kabul 
in chains, the Kotwal made his peace with the Amir, 
and continued for some time in the enjoyment of his 
position, which included torturing and killing people 
in horrible ways, and the acquisition of wealth by 
bribery and extortion, so that when he died of cholera 
some eight years later he was possessed of several 
lakhs of rupees. The day he died, I overheard some 
soldiers gloating over the fact that that night his 
soul would be roasting in hell, and I fancy some few 
thousand others derived consolation from the same 
thought, and knowing what I did of him myself, the 
fate the soldiers assigned him seemed not an im- 
probable one. 

According to the Afghan theory, the soul of a 
man is judged the night of the day he is buried, 
hence the delight of the soldiers over what would 
take place that night after the judgment had been 
pronounced. 

The camp at each stopping-place looked rather 
imposing, and gave the impression of an immense 
gathering, as, besides the prince with his retinue and 

8 




S 
5 

I 



On the Road 

soldiers, were the men in charge of the baggage 
animals, who of themselves formed a rather large 
company, for the camels alone numbered half a 
thousand, so that the tents, horses, and camels 
covered a large tract of ground. After nightfall all 
the fires at which the men were cooking their food 
showed up clearly, and each fire had its quota of men 
busily superintending the pots and cooking arrange- 
ments generally, while others were standing or 
squatting round, watching and waiting the moment 
when, all being ready, they might fall to. 

The noises of the camp at night were numerous, 
though there was never any rowdiness, for an Afghan 
crowd is the most orderly and quiet of any country, 
but there were the voices of officers giving orders, 
the squeals of horses fighting with one that had got 
loose (and there always seemed a loose horse about at 
night), the gurgling of the camels, the challenges of 
soldiers on guard in guttural Afghani, and the strik- 
ing of gongs to announce the hour. 

I remember one night, or rather early morning, 
when the guard over the gong had evidently been 
asleep and waked up suddenly, hearing sixteen 
strokes of the gong in rapid succession, although it 
was only half-past one. Whether this was the result 
of nightmare, or whether the man thought a little 
extra activity would better demonstrate his extreme 
wakefulness, I cannot say. 

We were four days reaching Kandahar, for only 
on one day was the march at all a long one, the rest 

9 



Under the Absolute Amir 

being what they term " King's marches," in contra- 
distinction to " Caravan marches." King's marches 
being short ones on account of the number of men, 
etc., to move. The distance from one camp to 
another is usually expressed as so many hours' 
journey. The horses on a journey go at a uniform 
pace, something between a quick walk and a jog-trot 
to which they are trained, and at which pace they 
can, when in condition, cover fifty to sixty miles in a 
day, though it is not customary to push them to that 
extent except in cases of necessity. Taking into con- 
sideration the mountainous description of country 
usually met with, the absence of proper roads, and 
the size of the horses (which average thirteen to 
fourteen hands), this is a fair distance. 

They have a unit of distance in Afghanistan 
called a " kro," which is said by some to be equivalent 
to one and a half English miles, but as there are no 
recognized number of " guz " (yards) to the " kro " it 
assumes varying dimensions, according to individual 
taste. I once received a firman from the Amir, 
through the prince, to make a perambulating instru- 
ment for measuring roads which was to show distances 
on the index in guz and kro, and I wrote the 
prince to let me know the number of guz in a 
kro that I might arrange the necessary clockwork. 
He replied that he had made inquiries, and the 
number given by different persons so varied that 
he had written the Amir to fix a standard ; but the 
Amir fell ill just then, and the matter remained in 

10 



On the Road 

abeyance, and the same indefiniteness still exists. 
The present Amir has distances measured in yards 
and miles. 

Once when travelling from Kabul to Peshawar, 
and after being seven or eight hours in the saddle, I 
asked the sowars with me how far it was to tne 
village by which we intended camping. One usually 
is rather interested in knowing how much farther 
one has to go after several hours' riding. He told 
me that it was between one to two kro ahead, but 
we did not get to camp until after three hours' further 
riding. So I henceforth made it a custom to inquire 
the distance in hours, and found it less disappointing. 

On arriving within a few miles of Kandahar, the 
prince was met by the General commanding that 
district and the principal officers, who dismounted 
at a distance from him, and came up with heads 
uncovered. When they reached him they kissed his 
foot, and then, taking his hand between both of 
theirs, placed it on each eye in turn, and kissed it also ; 
this being the Afghan custom when acknowledging 
their chief or swearing allegiance. Near the city 
the troops of the garrison were drawn up, together 
with the artillery, and the latter fired the royal 
salute as the prince rode up. The prince then 
inspected the troops, and addressed a few words to 
them, after which, followed by all the officers and 
officials, he repaired to the musjid for prayers, 
while I rode on to the city to find the quarters 
which had been allotted to me. 

ii 



Under the Absolute Amir 

The road vid Kandahar is not one which is often 
used when travelling from India to Kabul, the road 
from Peshawar through the Khyber Pass being the 
direct route, and the journey by that road occupies 
about eight days when travelling with little luggage 
and doing forced marches, while the route vid 
Kandahar and Ghazni takes three or four weeks. 
There are no roads for wheeled traffic, nor are there 
any railways, and one must either ride or be carried 
in a sort of sedan chair, suspended from the backs 
of two horses. The Afghan rulers are greatly pre- 
judiced against railways, and if one but mentions 
such a scheme ulterior designs are at once suspected. 
Yet a proper scheme of railways to open up the 
country would make it rich and prosperous, and do 
away with the present universal poverty and misery. 

The Shahzada on leaving Kabul for England 
had been sent vid Peshawar by the late Amir, 
and arrangements had been made for him to return 
vid Kandahar, in order that he might see as much 
as possible of the country. Since he came from 
Eussia, a little boy of nine, he had never been more 
than a few miles out of Kabul, for the Amir did 
not encourage the members of his family to travel 
unless of necessity. The Amir also wished him to 
stop in Kandahar on his return journey to inquire 
into matters concerning its government, because for 
many years there had been complaints from the 
people of the oppression of the governors and 
absence of justice. 

12 



On the Road 

I was told, while in Kandahar, that the Amir made 
the previous governors, when accepting office, sign a 
paper providing that, should they rob or oppress 
either rich or poor, they consented to be hanged, and 
it was significant that the last three or four governors 
had been hanged. The man who was governor when 
the prince arrived suddenly fell ill, and died a few 
days afterwards, and there were not wanting those 
who suggested self-destruction in order to escape 
worse happening. 

Kandahar is situated in the middle of a fertile 
plain, or rather the plain would be fertile if irrigated 
and cultivated as it could be ; but when I was there, 
there was little cultivation or signs of it, although 
the rivers carry plenty of water. On account of the 
small amount of rainfall in Afghanistan irrigation is 
necessary in order to make the land yield crops ; and 
in some cases, to provide water for land which cannot 
be irrigated direct from the river, the people have 
sunk a series of wells leading from water-bearing 
strata to the land requiring irrigation, connecting 
the wells by underground ducts ; the water from the 
last well being raised to the surface by means of a 
Persian wheel. This is a laborious process, and as 
the connecting ducts are not arched or protected in 
any way, the supply is frequently stopped by the 
earth falling in, and crops are ruined before the 
supply can be set going again. 

I was asked to propose an irrigation scheme by 
which the whole of the surrounding land could be put 

13 



Under the Absolute Amir 

under cultivation, and gave my opinion ; but, although 
the work was feasible, it involved too great an outlay 
for the exchequer, and the matter was dropped. 

The city is not a large one, and is surrounded by 
a high wall, which, together with most of the build- 
ings, is built of mud and stone, or mud and sun-dried 
brick. The whole place is in a most tumble-down 
condition, having been partially destroyed several 
times during the wars of the past twenty years and 
not rebuilt. It gave one the idea that the inhabitants 
were in the utmost poverty, and although some of 
the better houses and musjids are built of small burnt 
bricks and lime, yet in all is the same appearance of 
dilapidation which made one think that the people 
were humbled and lacked the heart to put their city 
to rights. Some of the streets in the bazars are 
raised above the surrounding land, so that one looks 
down into the tumble-down shops, where copper, tin, 
leather, and other trades are carried on in a small 
way. 

One thing that struck me particularly when 
riding through the bazars was the small size of the 
donkeys, which are little bigger than a large mastiff. 
They are employed in carrying loads, and I saw many 
with such huge piles of grass on them that only the 
donkey's hoofs and a small portion of his head was 
visible. Ripe cases for the intervention of the 
Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. 

I was lodged in a small house, built in the form 
of a cross, and consisting of one room only, branching 



On the Road 

out on four sides, this form being, I believe, copied 
from Eussia. It was situated in the garden adjoining 
the house occupied by the prince, and as the weather 
was getting cold at night it was a decided improve- 
ment on a tent, although the architect had forgotten to 
include a fireplace. From the roof of the house I got 
a good view over most of the city, and could also see 
the minarets of the musjid in which is a sanctuary 
where any man, whatsoever his crime, is safe when 
once inside. There used to be similar sanctuaries in 
some old English churches. 

The late Amir once told me a story of a moullah in 
Kandahar who had dubbed him a " Kafir " (infidel) 
when inciting the people to rise against him. They 
had to make him out a " Kafir," as otherwise it is 
against the religious law for the people to rise 
against the King, who is also their spiritual head. 
When the ensuing rebellion had been put down the 
Amir was told that this man had taken refuge in the 
sanctuary. Then the Amir, turning the tables on 
the man, said that the sanctuary was for Mussulmans 
only, not for such infidels as men who rose against 
their king ; and, taking his sword, he went to the 
musjid and killed the man in the very place. It was 
little that stopped Abdur Kahman in the pursuit of 
vengeance. 



CHAPTER II 

ON THE EOAD continued 

Method of fishing in the rivers Route through Khilat and Mukur to 
Ghazni and distance from Kandahar Cold and snow on journey 
Ghazni Robberies and murders on roads before Amir Abdur Rah- 
man's time Villages and cultivation en route Arrival in Kabul and 
reception of Sirdar Nasrullah by Amir. 

AFTER spending a few days in the city of Kandahar 
the prince went out to a garden a few miles up the 
river to spend a couple of days in fishing. On the 
evening of our arrival the prince told his suite that 
the following day all must appear in Afghan costume, 
and that any one who came in English dress would 
be thrown into the adjoining river. The river was 
a shallow one, so it meant a ducking only. One of 
the men there suggested that I should be included, 
but was ruled out on the grounds that I wore the 
costume of my country. In order to afford amuse- 
ment and please the prince, one or two men did go 
the next day in English dress, and were ducked, 
much to the merriment of all there. 

About midday, the weather having cleared, the 
prince and the rest of us started up the river, walking 
along the banks, while horses were led by syces for 
fording branches of the river, or the river itself when 

16 



On the Road 

required. Two fishermen, casting their circular nets 
as they went, waded up the river, the party on the 
banks keeping well behind them so as not to disturb 
the fish before the nets were thrown. The bed of 
the river was covered with shingle and stones, with 
boulders jutting out here and tTiere, and the water 
did not seem to exceed more than four feet in depth 
at any place, and, being the time of low water, it was 
perfectly clear. There was a good catch of fish, which 
in appearance very much resembled trout, some of 
them being four to five pounds in weight, but the 
flavour of the fish had little to recommend it. 

The circular nets used by the fishermen are 
similar to those used by natives in India. They 
are ten to fourteen feet in diameter, and weighted 
round the circumference at short intervals with 
leaden pellets, while between the pellets are pockets 
into which a fish swimming under the net in an 
endeavour to escape gets his head, and his body 
too if not a large one, and is so prevented from 
escaping. To the centre of the net a long cord is 
attached. 

The method of using the net is this : the end 
of the cord is fastened round the right wrist by a 
slip knot and the rest of the cord gathered up in 
coils which are held in the right hand. The net 
is then held up by the cord so that it may hang 
in regular folds, and one half of these folds are 
arranged consecutively over the left arm and the 
rest over the right, both arms being held out to 

17 c 



Under the Absolute Amir 

carry them, and care being taken to avoid one fold 
entangling with another. The hands grip the folds 
nearest them, and then, after one or two preliminary 
swings, the net is thrown forward, and outward, in such 
manner as to spread out and cover as large an area 
as the net is capable of before striking the water. 
On striking the water the weighted periphery sinks 
at once and encloses any fish within its area. 

The principle of landing the fish netted may be 
explained by supposing a circular cloth with its 
circumference weighted at short intervals spread out 
on a table. If the centre of the cloth is taken and 
slowly lifted, the circumference of the cloth will drag 
in over the table towards the centre until it becomes 
massed together just before it is lifted clear. In the 
case of the net the weights round the circumference 
press against each other sufficiently to prevent fish 
falling through while it is lifted clear of the water 
on to the bank. 

It is no easy matter to use this net without a 
good deal of practice, the gathering of the folds over 
the arms preliminary to throwing being particularly 
awkward, and seeming at first to require three hands 
at least. The Afghan fishermen are very expert in 
throwing it, and can make it assume circular, oblong, 
or triangular shapes, according to the requirements of 
the river or stream in which they are fishing and the 
rocks and other obstacles it is necessary the net 
should avoid when cast. But that is a refinement in 
throwing which requires some years' experience. 

18 



On the Road 

In nets for catching large fish the weights are 
necessarily heavier than those intended for small 
ones, but a couple of hours' fishing with a light net 
will be found sufficient exercise for one day for those 
not accustomed to them. Those who find it neces- 
sary to fish for the sake of the catch and not for 
sport will find these nets useful. 

The prince, after spending a couple of days in the 
garden, returned to the city, but not liking the house 
he had occupied there he went the next day to stop 
at the Munzil Bagh, a new palace the Amir had built 
a year or so before just outside the city walls. I was 
given a tent pitched in the adjoining garden, because 
the rooms of the place were large and few, and 
sufficient only for the accommodation of the Shahzada 
and his personal attendants. 

While here, I fell ill with fever and dysentery, and 
having no English medicines with me I might have 
fared rather badly. The prince, however, on hearing 
that I was ill, sent his own hakeem, or doctor, to attend 
me, and this man did his best, and gave me every 
attention. I was not quite as grateful at the time as 
I ought to have been, for three times a day he 
brought me medicine in a two-pint glass filled to the 
brim with some bitter concoction and sat there while 
I drank it, and as part of his treatment was also to 
starve me until the disease passed, I felt in rather a 
hurry to get better. Towards the end of my illness, 
however, I persuaded him to send the medicine to me 
and not to put himself to the trouble of bringing it, 

19 



Under the Absolute Amir 

and then I found a convenient crack in the dry earth 
under my bed which absorbed the bulk of the liquid 
better than I could, and I am inclined to think that 
taking medicine in the Afghan manner is more or 
less an acquired habit. When I was convalescent, 
this hakeem selected all food that was to be cooked 
for me, and did so in such generous quantities 
that, after my enforced fast, I was in danger of 
getting ill in other ways. I really ought to have 
been more grateful, for he was very conscientious, 
and liberal too, and took the greatest interest in 
my case. 

When I was well again I rode about the country 
around a good deal and found plenty of partridge 
and quail shooting, and I heard that deer could be 
got further away ; but as it involved the trouble of 
camping out for a night or two I did not think it 
worth while to try my luck, and camping out with 
a small escort was hardly advisable. 

One day I came across an abandoned gold mine, 
which I had previously heard the people speak of as 
yielding large quantities of gold in its time. A huge 
hole had been blasted out of the mountain-side, and 
heaps of debris were scattered about, in some parts 
entirely filling up previous excavations. The quartz 
veins had been mined in all directions, but the gold 
had evidently been in a " pocket," and there was 
nothing further to be had. I had a great desire for 
an opportunity of thoroughly trying the place myself, 
and while I pottered about the sowar escort with me 

20 



On the Road 

broke up lumps of quartz to see what they might 
find. Gold exercises a fascination over most 
people. 

A sowar escort of seven men, with their dufiedar 
(sergeant), had been appointed to attend me wherever 
I went from the day I crossed the frontier, and, as the 
penalty, should a fanatic attack and kill me, was death 
to themselves, they kept very close to me and left 
nothing whatever to chance. 

The prince spent about a month in Kandahar and 
was getting rather gloomy at the thought of being 
kept there for the winter, for it was getting on towards 
the end of November, when one evening I went to 
pay my compliments, or salaam him, as they call it, 
and met him coming into the durbar room as I got 
there. I saw that he was very pleased and excited, 
and he called out, " How do you do ? " (almost all the 
English he knew) when he saw me, and shook hands, 
which was a thing he seldom did, and then told me 
that the Amir's firman had been received, and he was 
to go on at once to Kabul. I made a remark about 
it being rather cold weather for travelling, and he 
assured me pleasantly that on the march it would be 
twenty times colder than in Kandahar. As the water 
in my tent froze every night I saw nothing to con- 
gratulate myself upon ; however, the prospect of being 
on the move again was exhilarating. 

That evening the prince had some musicians 
brought in. They played upon instruments made of 
some sort of cane or bamboo, which rather resemble 

21 



Under the Absolute Amir 

the flute, and although Afghan music is not usually 
soothing to the Western ear, I found the music these 
men played rather pleasant and lively. The instru- 
ments they used are peculiar to Kandahar, I was 
told, and the prince wanted one of the men to 
accompany him to Kabul ; but the man was not 
attracted by the idea, and managed to evade the 
invitation. 

The Shahzada left Kandahar the following week, 
the intervening time being taken up in preparations 
for the journey, although such preparation might 
easily have been completed in half the time ; but it is 
not the habit of the people to rush things. Their 
custom is, instead, to put off all they can until to- 
morrow, or the day after, that for preference. The 
first day's camp was only twelve miles or so out of 
Kandahar, for it is customary always to make the 
first day's march a short one, in order to prepare the 
horses and pack animals for the ensuing journey, and 
it affords a means of testing the arrangements of the 
march generally. 

The route to Kabul lay through Khilat, Mukur, 
and Ghazni. The road as far as Khilat, which took 
four days' journey, runs in a north-easterly direction, 
and mostly alongside the river, which flows down 
towards Kandahar from the mountains beyond. The 
track rises gradually over a rather flat country, but 
there are mountain ranges at a little distance on both 
sides. Beyond that to Mukur, another four days' 
journey, the road skirts the foot of some mountain 

22 



On the Road 

ranges, and forms a fair road for travelling without 
any difficult passes to get over. 

From Mukur to Ghazni it runs over a high table- 
land, with mountain ranges on either side, which, run- 
ning in the same direction, give it the appearance of 
an immense roadway. It took four days to cross this 
and get to Ghazni, and it was by far the coldest part 
of the journey, for the wind was icy, and its keen- 
ness such that it pierced the thickest clothing I had. 
Although the sun was bright during the day it had no 
warmth, and the surrounding mountains were covered 
with snow, but it was not until the day before we 
reached Ghazni that snow fell, and made sleeping 
under canvas more unpleasant than it had been. It 
came on at night, and when I awoke in the morning 
I found it covering the boxes in my tent and my bed 
too, for the wind had blown the flap of the tent 
open and allowed the snow to drift in. It was chilly 
dressing before the sun was up, and as my clothes, 
which I had thrown over a chair, were also covered 
with snow, I had to get dry ones out of my boxes, 
the while being lightly clad in a night-suit and 
slippers. 

That day's march to Ghazni was a trying on ; e. 
Before this the days had been bright and the air dry, 
but the moisture given out by the snow made the 
wind still more biting, and we had to dismount 
occasionally to bring some feeling into hands and 
feet, and to rub noses and ears to prevent frostbite. 
Many of the Afghans wore hoods shaped like 

23 



Under the Absolute Amir 

Balaklava caps which left only the eyes exposed, and 
I thought them a very sensible protection against 
such severe weather, and wished I had one. 

The snow made the ground very slippery, and 
many horses fell. The camels were worse off in 
that respect than the horses, for their broad flat 
feet, which slide in all directions on a wet road, are 
ill-adapted for travelling over snow, and, being also 
heavily laden, they sooner or later came down, some 
of them breaking their legs and having to be killed. 
As, however, camel flesh is an article of diet they 
were not a literal dead loss to their owners. 

Outside Ghazni the Shahzada was met by the 
officers and officials there, who brought him presents 
of cloth, horses, and money, and when the city was 
reached the royal salute was fired by the artillery, 
which, with several horse regiments, was drawn up 
to receive him. He afterwards went into the city, 
where he held durbar for a couple of hours before 
coming on to the camp, which was pitched outside 
the walls. 

Ghazni is situated in a small valley almost sur- 
rounded with low hills. It is a very small place, and 
is enclosed by a high wall, as all towns and villages 
in Afghanistan are. It has nothing about it to show 
that it was once the royal city and the home of 
emperors. There are no fine buildings, and its streets 
are very narrow and dirty, and the bazars far from 
good. It boasts a bala-hisar (high fort) which com- 
mands the surrounding land, but which itself could 

24 



On the Road 

be commanded from the neighbouring heights with 
the guns of the present day. 

Up to Ghazni the march was forced in order to 
get over the worst part of the journey before the 
middle of December, when the heavy falls of snow 
usually commence, for the table-land which has to 
be crossed before reaching Ghazni is well known 
to those who travel that way, and many have been 
overtaken by snow and perished there. Consequently 
each day's march was a fairly long one, and one day 
was close on forty miles, which for a Shahzada is 
looked upon as a good distance. I had been unused 
to riding for some months before, and at first was 
rather saddle-sore, but soon got hardened. 

On some of the longer marches the prince rode 
most of the distance on camels, and on those 
occasions I went on ahead to escape the dust and 
discomfort of the extra pace, for a riding camel's 
trot is very trying to keep up with on horseback. 
Being ahead, I was able to trot or canter over the 
best bits of road and walk the others, but the dis- 
advantage of forcing the pace lay in having to wait 
three or four hours after reaching camp for the 
baggage animals to come in with tents and servants, 
and then another hour or so for food to be prepared. 
Usually, I got my lunch any time between four 
and nine o'clock in the evening, and I found that 
waiting about in a bitter wind for several hours 
without tent or food was very cold work, particularly 
when tired after a long ride. While riding, my feet 

25 



Under the Absolute Amir 

were generally so numbed with cold that they had 
no feeling, and in camp in the evenings the coldness 
increased to such an extent that water thrown on 
the ground froze immediately, and my khansaman 
showed me that knives dipped in water came out 
with a thin film of ice on them, so that after 
nightfall when the wind was at its bitterest, as 
the temperature fell lower and lower, one was glad 
to get into bed as soon as possible to get warm. 

One evening I had a hole dug in the floor of 
the tent and a fire made in it, but in less than two 
minutes I was outside, coughing, while my eyes were 
streaming, and I had to wait outside in the cold 
for some time until the wind had cleared the tent 
of smoke. After that I got a munkal, or iron dish 
that stands on four legs, and had a fire made in that 
outside the tent, and when the wood had burnt away 
until nothing but glowing cinders were left, I had it 
brought inside, and found that it made the place more 
comfortable. Before going to sleep, when nothing 
but hot ashes were left in the munkal, I used to 
put it under the bed, and found a material increase 
in warmth there, for I had no mattress, and slept 
on rezais (quilted coverlets), which were not altogether 
impervious to the icy wind which came in under the 
walls of the tent and played under the bed. 

We passed several villages on the way, some 
perched halfway up a mountain and some in the 
valley below, but all surrounded by high walls for 
protection. Gardens and cultivated land lay outside 

26 



On the Road 

the villages, and as we rode past, some of the big 
Afghan dogs, which rather resemble a St. Bernard, 
would come tearing out, barking, and looking savage 
enough and big enough to eat one. They are fierce 
brutes, and often try to pull a passing traveller out 
of the saddle ; but they need be big and savage, 
for they are used principally as sheepdogs, and on 
occasion have to attack and kill wolves. 

The people in the country are mostly robbers, 
and in the days before Amir Abdur Eahman took 
the country in hand, travellers fared badly, unless 
they kept together in bands of thirty or more, for 
even poor men travelling alone have been known 
to be killed for the sake of the clothes they 
wore. 

There are many stories told of the treatment 
offered travellers by villagers in outlying districts, 
and one case was that of a poor man who was going 
along carrying a sack on his shoulders, and was seen 
by one of these robbers, who, thinking that the sack 
must contain something valuable, waited behind a 
rock until the man got within range, and then fired 
and killed him ; but on the robber going over to his 
victim, and opening the bag, he found in it nothing 
but dried dung (used as fuel by the poor classes), 
whereupon, bewailing the waste of his cartridge, he 
kicked the body and strode off. I was told of another 
case where thirteen men who were travelling during 
the winter were stopped and robbed of all they 
possessed, the villagers even stripping them of the 

27 



Under the Absolute Amir 

clothes they had on, and leaving them to perish in 
the cold. 

The Amir's method of putting this sort of robbery 
and murder down was simple and effective. If a 
man was robbed or killed, all villages within a radius 
of about ten miles of the place where the crime was 
perpetrated were fined from twenty to fifty thousand 
rupees, and if the people failed to pay up promptly, 
two or three regiments of soldiers were sent and 
quartered on them until payment was effected. 
When an Afghan soldier is quartered on any one, he 
takes the best of everything in the house, the best 
bed, best room, and best food, and if there are no 
fowl or sheep the man of the house must procure 
them at once, even if he has to sell all he has to 
get them. If he does not do this, then the butt 
end of a rifle is applied to the small of his back, 
or even worse befalls. The villager had no redress, 
because it is a Government soldier doing his duty. 
In this way the Government fines are paid in as 
quickly as possible, for each day's delay means a 
great loss to each house in the village. 

The effect of the Amir's policy was to make each 
villager chary of allowing his neighbour to molest 
a traveller, as all suffered alike for the crime of one, 
and at the time I passed over the road, a single 
traveller might go all the way from Kandahar to 
Kabul without being unduly troubled. That is, pro- 
vided he was not a foreigner, and Persians and 
Hindustanis come under that category, for such 

28 



On the Road 

have no friends to make complaints to the Govern- 
ment and cause bothersome inquiries, and are, 
therefore, looked upon as fair sport. 

The road from Khilat is fairly level until it nears 
Ghazni, when it falls down towards it, and then 
beyond Ghazni it rises again over the Darwaza 
Ghazni pass, and beyond that falls again towards 
Kabul. 

Between Ghazni and Kabul, the country, being 
at a much lower altitude than that already passed 
over, the weather was much milder ; but there was 
snow on the hills around, and the temperature at 
night was below freezing-point. We were five days 
travelling over this part of the road, and the country 
passed through was rather hilly ; but it was well 
cultivated in the valleys, and there were many small 
villages about. 

The road from Chaman to Kandahar, and thence 
to Kabul, could readily be made fit for wheeled traffic, 
and would offer no difficulties to the construction of 
a railway, and the fact that the two heavy siege guns, 
presented to the Amir by the Indian Government, 
were taken that way and drawn by traction engines 
shows sufficiently the ease with which a good road 
might be made. 

When we arrived at Kila Durani we were only 
ten or twelve miles from Kabul as the crow flies, 
but had to go on round by the pass some twenty 
miles farther on. Close by this village we passed 
over one of the English battlefields with mounds of 

29 



Under the Absolute Amir 

stones piled up over those who had fallen. Seated 
on one of these mounds of stones I noticed a very 
old man rocking his body backwards and forwards 
and muttering to himself, and when I had gone on 
a little distance I heard one of the soldiers behind 
shout, and turning round saw this old man following 
me with a huge stone, which he could hardly carry. 
The sowars with me laughingly told him that the 
Amir Sahib would imprison him if he tried to kill 
me ; but the old man said that the English had 
killed his son and he would kill an Englishman 
in return. It 1 was more pathetic than laughable to 
see this poor old man gone mad through losing his 
son some years before, and carrying a stone he was 
unable to throw to take vengeance. It, however, 
typifies the character of the people. 

When we reached Kila Kazee, which is about 
eight miles from Kabul, we had to camp there for 
three days so that the prince might ride into Kabul 
on the Sunday following, that being an auspicious 
day according to the astrologers, who are always 
consulted on these matters. 

The day we got into camp Sirdar Habibullah 
Khan (the present Amir) rode out to see his brother, 
and spent the night with him, returning to Kabul the 
following day. Sirdar Mahomed Omar also came to 
see him, and as he is the son of the Queen-Sultana, 
and was about ten years old at the time, the prince 
ordered a display of fireworks that night in order to 
please him. Sirdar is the title, equivalent to prince, 

30 



On the Road 

conferred on the Amir's sons only, although the 
people use it when addressing other members of the 
royal family, as a term of respect. 

On the Sunday the prince and his suite rode into 
Kabul, dressed in the best they had for the occasion, 
and all cheerful at the thought of being home at last. 
About halfway a large shamiana was erected, and 
here the Shahzada's son, a little child of two years, 
together with the sons of Sirdar Habibullah Khan, 
were waiting to meet him. The prince seemed a 
good deal affected on seeing his child, which rather 
surprised me, as I had always thought him very 
unemotional. We spent an hour or so sitting under 
the shamiana while tea and refreshments were served, 
and then rode on. 

Outside the city of Kabul, on an open space close 
to the workshops, several regiments and two or three 
batteries of artillery were drawn up, and in front of 
the troops was Sirdar Habibullah, together with the 
General commanding the Kabul troops, and other 
officers, who were waiting to receive the prince and 
accompany him to the Salaam khana. On the 
Shahzada's approach the guns fired the royal salute, 
and then, when the different officers had come up and 
saluted the prince, they all rode on together towards 
the city. Thousands of people lined the roads to 
watch the tamasha, and soldiers were stationed at 
intervals to keep the people back and leave a clear 
road for the princes and others to pass. 

The Amir was holding a public durbar to receive 



Under the Absolute Amir 

his son, safely returned after travelling so far, and on 
arrival the prince dismounted at the gate and walked 
through the gardens to the Salaam khan, where, 
having been announced to the Amir, he walked up the 
durbar hall and, kneeling, took his father's hand in 
both his and, placing it on each eye in turn, kissed 
it, while invoking blessings and giving the usual 
salutations. The Amir, raising the prince, told him 
to be seated, and then for the rest of the day there 
were rejoicings, and all officials and officers came in 
turn to the durbar to salaam the Amir and give 
thanks for the safe return of his son. 



CHAPTER III 

KABUL 

The Mihman khana or Guest-house Description of hamams (Turkish 
baths) Description of people met with on roads and streets Amir 
Abdul Rahman Description of palace and audience chamber, and 
his reception of me Situation of Kabul and description of country 
around Kabul city, its bazars, streets, and filth Water-supply and 
drainage systems Sanitary arrangements Pariah dogs and crows 
scavenging city. 

ON the morning after my arrival, I was walking in 
the garden when the court interpreter came to tell 
me that the Amir Sahib had ordered that I was to be 
favoured with an interview that afternoon. This was 
my second visit to Kabul, and I was no stranger to 
the Amir, who had the gift of not forgetting any 
one he once saw. 

The Amir had given orders that I was to be 
treated with great honour and courtesy, and the 
house in which I had been given quarters was 
the new Mihman khana or Guest-house, in which the 
Amir himself had been stopping until a few days 
before. It is an extensive square building with 
large rooms, originally intended for one of the Amir's 
summer palaces, and is situated on the outskirts of 
the new city. An extensive garden surrounds the 

33 D 



Under the Absolute Amir 

house, and the whole is enclosed by a high wall, and 
in one of the walls is a covered gateway, on either 
side of which are rooms for the use of the outer 
guard. Outhouses are built on the inner side of 
the wall for the use of the servants, and at the end of 
the outhouses is the kitchen, and adjoining that the 
hamam (Turkish bath), without which, no large house 
in Kabul is considered complete. It was in this 
hamam that I had the day before enjoyed the first 
comfortable bath since leaving Kandahar. 

The hamam consists of two rooms, one opening 
into the other, with domed roofs, the floors flagged 
with large stone slabs, and the ceilings and walls 
plastered with cement. The rooms are heated from a 
fireplace built outside, the flue from which branches 
out under the inner chamber, and up through the 
walls of the outer one. The wall at the fireplace end 
of the inner chamber is double, and the intervening 
space is occupied by two cisterns, the one for hot 
water being immediately over the fire, and the other 
for cold water alongside it, and pipes fitted with taps 
convey the water to the inner room. The inner 
chamber is ; the hot one, and is used for ablutions, 
while the outer one is for cooling down in and 
dressing. It is not advisable to spend too much time 
in these hamams, as the air, for want of proper 
ventilation, is rather foul, and also, as the stone flags 
are not too well jointed, the gases from the fire 
get in, so that a prolonged visit generally ends in a 
bad headache. They are, nevertheless, a great 

34 



Kabul 

convenience in the cold weather, which is much more 
severe than the average English winter, but they 
take about two days' firing to get properly heated, 
and must be fired every day if wanted for regular 
use. Once heated, however, it requires but little fuel 
to keep the temperature up. 

Accompanied by the translator, I rode off soon 
after midday to keep the appointment made by the 
Amir, but about halfway to the palace we were met 
by a messenger bringing a note. It was from the 
Amir, saying, that as he had risen late, he would not 
be able to see me at the appointed time, and there- 
fore told me to eome an hour later. To have a letter 
putting off the appointment to a later hour is an 
extreme mark of honour, for usually when one is 
ordered to be present at an appointed time, one has 
to sit and wait if the Amir is not ready to receive. 

I spent the intervening hour in riding about the 
streets and roads on the outskirts of the city, where 
the palaces of the Amir and princes are situated, and 
where the officials and courtiers and others have their 
houses and gardens. This part, which lies to the 
north-west of the old city, is generally called Deh 
Afghanan, from a small village of Afghan people 
which lies in that direction ; and here the roads are 
broad and well laid out, but at that time they were 
not metalled, and after rain or snow, the horses' feet 
sank inches deep in mud and slush, and pedestrians 
had to walk warily. At the present time the 
principal roads round Kabul are metalled, and riding 

35 



Under the Absolute Amir 

or walking is not the mud-besplashing process it 
once was. 

The people met with were unwashed and unkempt 
in appearance. Even those who were apparently high 
in rank, and came along the road on horseback, with 
five or six servants running beside them, looked as 
though they had washed their faces just before 
leaving the house, and had forgotten to wash their 
necks. The clean, fresh look of those who bathe 
regularly was missing, and, although I found after- 
wards that the better classes bathe but once a week 
or less, and the others once in a few months, it may, 
perhaps, be the dark sallow skin of the neck which 
gives the unwashed appearance. Also the dress of 
the people being part English and part Afghan, and 
their habit of putting on a clean shirt once a week 
only adds to the appearance of untidyness, and makes 
them look as though a good all-over scrubbing would 
do them good. 

The Amir was stopping in the Boistan Serai, a 
small palace built outside the gardens which surround 
the fortified palace of Arak, and alongside the 
Queen- Sultana's palace, which is called the Gulistan 
Serai. Boistan and Gulistan both signify garden, the 
translation of the former being " place of scents," 
and the latter, " place of flowers." Kabul itself 
might be termed " boistan " in another sense, which 
a ride through its bazars would indicate. 

On my arrival, with the interpreter, at the gate of 
the palace, the captain of the guard there conducted 

36 



Kabul 

us to an inner court, where we waited while the Amir 
was informed by the officer on duty that I was 
present; and on the Amir ordering that I wasto be 
admitted, they conducted me into his presence. 

On entering the audience chamber I saw the 
Amir seated on the side of the couch he used as a 
bed. He was dressed in an English grey tweed suit, 
and on his head was the Afghan silk fez, with the 
royal diamond star at the side of it. The Amir 
suffered a good deal from gout, and preferred the side 
of his bed for sitting on, as being more comfortable 
than a chair, and also, if not feeling well, he was able 
to stretch himself on the bed, and rest himself, 
without the trouble of first getting up from a chair. 

In appearance the Amir looked about forty-five 
years of age, although nearer sixty, and this was due 
to his hair and beard being died black, making him 
look younger than he was. In person he was very 
stout and broad, with a rather long body, and short 
legs. His eyes were very dark, almost black, and 
looked out from under his heavy brows with quick, 
keen glances, while in complexion he was sallow, but 
his skin was not darker than the average Portuguese. 
The Amir had a full set of false teeth, and these he 
would take out at times and polish with his handker- 
chief, while continuing to speak, but the difference in 
his pronunciation made it difficult to follow him. He 
once handed his teeth to me to examine, and ex- 
plained that one of his own men had made them for 
him, having learnt the art from an English dentist. 

37 



Under the Absolute Amir 

Around the Amir were slave boys ready to attend 
his least want, and in front of him, standing round 
about the room, were officers and officials, and 
at the door were two men of the royal body- 
guard with bayonets fixed, while the captain of 
the guard, carrying an unsheathed sword, stood by 
them. 

The audience chamber was a large one, and the 
floor was covered with fine Persian carpets, but it was 
bare of furniture, save the velvet-covered armchairs 
and small round-topped tables which were ranged at 
intervals along the wall round the room. On the walls 
were oil paintings representing landscapes only, for 
figure paintings are not allowed in a room where 
prayers are said, and this applies to all rooms, for 
Mussulmans say their prayers wherever they may 
happen to be, and the reason for this is, they say, 
that to pray before a pictured figure would give the 
appearance of idolatry. 

Walking up the durbar room I stood before the 
Amir, and bowed ; and he asked, according to the usual 
greeting, if I was well, and took off his glove to shake 
hands (the gout in his right hand necessitated his 
wearing a glove in cold weather), saying that it was 
not etiquette among the English to shake hands 
with gloves on, and then, after the many salutations 
usual in Persian, he told me to be seated, and there- 
after talked to me for several hours, and told me 
anecdotes of his career and life in Russia, and 
generally showed me honour in the gracious courtly 

38 



Kabul 

manner he could so well assume when it pleased 
him. 

After sitting down, a small table was placed near 
me, and tea, fruit, and cigarettes were brought in. 
My tea was served in a Russian cup, which con- 
sisted of a glass tumbler fixed in a gold holder 
with handle, and carried on a gold saucer, a fashion 
the Amir had adopted from the Russians. 

When with the Amir on an occasion like this, it 
was unnecessary to talk one's self. The Amir did all 
the talking, and all he required of one was to listen 
and answer shortly, except when some matter re- 
quired full explanation, and then he would listen 
very attentively. In relating anything humorous 
he would laugh very heartily, sometimes rolling on 
his bed, but, whether serious or laughing, the Amir 
was always the king, and there was that about him 
which forbade any one taking advantage of his 
humour. When roused to anger his face became 
drawn, and his teeth would show until he looked 
wolfish, and then he hissed words rather than spoke 
them, and there were few of those before him who did 
not tremble when he was in that mood, for it was 
then that the least fault involved some horrible 
punishment. It was also in these moods that the 
Amir would remember the former offences of those 
whom he had marked down for punishment, and he 
would take advantage of any trifling neglect of 
duty or other small offence to inflict a heavy 
punishment, so that the feelings of those present 

39 



Under the Absolute Amir 

on these occasions may be imagined, for none knew 
what the Amir had in his mind against them on 
account of former misdemeanours. 

When in the Amir's presence no one ever ventured 
to speak unless asked a question, or else they caught 
his eye and received an inquiring look and the 
upward nod of interrogation characteristic of him. 
The page-boys moved about quietly and noiselessly 
in the execution of their duty, coming in and going 
out as they wished, but always careful that several 
of their number remained near the Amir. 

While I was with the Amir, Sirdar Nasrullah 
Khan, whom I had accompanied from London, came 
in, and, after salaaming his father, was told to take 
a chair. A chair was always offered to either of 
his elder sons when they came to visit him, as they 
did most days if only for a short time, excepting 
on those occasions when they were in disgrace or 
the Amir in a bad humour, and then they were not 
asked to take a seat, and had to remain standing. 
When the younger princes visited him they would 
stand behind his chair or couch and act as the 
ordinary page-boys did, handing him anything he 
wanted, and waiting on him generally. When the 
princes wanted to go away they would again salaam 
their father and walk out, no permission being asked 
or required. 

To be allowed to sit in the Amir's presence is a 
sign of great favour and an honour accorded to few, 
and chiefs and high officials when asked to sit down, 

40 




- <5 

' - 



Kabul 

would do so on the floor, sitting with their backs 
against the wall, and if many were present they 
would sit in a line along the wall on either side 
of the Amir, those highest in rank or favour being 
nearest him. 

After spending some hours with the Amir, I 
asked permission to leave, and as I stood up to go 
he told me I was to come to him the next day, and 
very often after that, for he wished to see much of 
me. His asking me to come often was another 
mark of extreme honour, and showed that I enjoyed 
great favour, and there is nothing an ambitious 
man in that country covets so much as being 
allowed often in the Amir's presence, and there is 
a good deal of scheming done to be able to do so. 
For one thing, it is a sign of the highest favour 
and confidence, and for another all men regard 
that man as one to be fawned on and flattered ; 
and although he may be hated by the envious, 
he is also feared, and becomes a man of consequence. 

The next two months or so I spent in the 
Mihman khana (Gruest-house), -occupying myself in 
preparing a scheme for the development of the re- 
sources of the country, which the Amir had asked 
me to write. He was good enough to give me very 
high praise for it, but very few of the proposals 
embodied in the scheme were carried out. I also 
rode a good deal about the surrounding country, 
and through the bazars of the city, for there is 
little else to do as a means of recreation. 



Under the Absolute Amir 

Kabul is situated in the midst of a large valley, 
surrounded with mountains at distances varying 
from fifteen to twenty miles. The small ranges of 
hills, which rise up out of the plain here and there, 
give a broken-up appearance to the country, so 
that the whole of the valley is not discernible 
except from a height. One of these ranges, the 
Sher Darwaza (Lion of the gate), is immediately 
south of the city, and on the west rise the Asman 
Heights. Between the two the Kabul river flows, 
coming from the south-west. Along the crest of 
the heights is an old wall, mostly in ruins, and 
built in the usual way of mud and stone. It follows 
the undulations of the summits, and running down 
to the pass through which the river flows, it rises 
up again and winds along the heights on the opposite 
side. Formerly, the wall crossed the river by means 
of a brick bridge, but there is nothing to be seen 
of the bridge now except the ruined abutments. 
This wall was built many years ago as a protection 
against the raids of the wild tribes inhabiting the 
country south-west of Kabul, who frequently fell 
upon the city in great numbers, putting the people 
to the sword and carrying off all the loot they could 
get, including women and cattle, both of which are 
looked upon in much the same light in Afghanistan. 

The country round Kabul is well cultivated, and 
as there is little rainfall irrigation is resorted to for 
watering the crops. Trees have of late years been 
planted along most of the roads leading from the 

42 



Kabul 

city, and some are to be seen in the walled-in gardens 
which dot the plain here and there, but on the hills 
round about the absence of trees and vegetation makes 
them look very bare and desolate by contrast. 

The city contains some hundred and fifty to 
a hundred and sixty thousand inhabitants, and, like 
all other cities in the country, is walled-in. On the 
north-west side the city has overgrown itself, and here 
the palaces of the Amir and princes and houses of 
the officials and well-to-do people are built. Deh 
Afghanan, which gives its name to the new portion 
of the city, also lies on this side, and is yearly growing 
larger, for all who can leave the old portion of the 
city do so, and build houses and live in the fashionable 
quarter. 

The streets of the city are narrow and winding, 
and are mostly paved with round cobble stones of 
varying sizes and badly laid, and in the interstices 
between the stones a horse sometimes gets its hoof 
and lames itself. The roadways are sloped from the 
houses on either side towards the centre for the pur- 
pose of drainage, and refuse is thrown out into the 
street from the houses, and lies where it falls and rots, 
so that the stench on occasions when there is little 
wind is particularly trying. 

The houses and shops are built of sun-dried brick 
and clay, with flat roofs formed of timbers stretching 
from wall to wall which are covered with grass mats, 
over which a thick layer of clay is laid. The floors 
of the rooms are of the same materials, and the houses 

43 



Under the Absolute Amir 

are small and packed close together. The upper stories 
of the houses in the wider bazars jut out over the 
streets, the ends of the overhanging beams being sup- 
ported by wooden struts. In the narrower streets the 
upper stories cover the road entirely, forming dark 
crooked passages of unpleasant odour through which 
it is best to pick one's way with a light. The widest 
bazars are about fifteen feet in width, and the narrowest 
about four feet, and as pack horses and camels carry- 
ing loads are to be met with all over the city, it is 
often a matter of difficulty to avoid being swept out 
of the saddle when riding past them. The strings of 
loaded camels are worse than the pack-horses in this 
respect, for the camel has no thought for others, and 
sticks to the middle of the street, its load projecting 
far on either side, and necessitating a horseman 
stretching himself flat along the back of his horse 
to get past, and it is in the narrowest part of a bazar 
that one meets these obstructions more often than 
not. 

Streams of water led from a higher level up the 
river run alongside the street through most of the 
bazars for the use of the inhabitants. The water is 
good enough where it enters the city, but as it goes 
on it gathers impurities of all sorts. Eefuse and filth 
from the houses find their way into it, people sit and 
wash themselves in it, and dead bodies, too, are washed 
in the same stream without thought of the disease 
which caused death. By the time the water reaches 
the Bala Hisar side of the city its quality may be 

44 



Kabul 

imagined, and yet this is the water the inhabitants 
have to use for drinking and cooking purposes. In 
cholera and other epidemics it is in that portion of 
the city which the water reaches last where the 
disease rages most, and no doubt it is the washing 
of the bodies of people dead of the disease in the 
same water used by others for drinking which accounts 
for a good deal of the spread and long stay of those 
epidemics which visit Kabul periodically and carry off 
so many thousands of its inhabitants. 

Shortly before Amir Abdur Kahman's death he 
instituted a system of latrines in the city with 
donkeys to carry away the soil, selling the latter 
to those cultivators who required it. This did much 
to sweeten the city, but as all private houses could 
not be included in the scheme because only the larger 
houses have refuse-shoots built up against the outside 
wall whence the soil could be carried away, and no 
strange man may enter a house where women are, 
there was still a good deal left to be desired. The 
present Amir, during the cholera epidemic of 1903, 
had all the streets of the city swept and cleaned daily 
by an army of sweepers, and this was a step in the 
right direction, but with the necessity for cleanliness 
removed orientals soon fall back into their happy-go- 
lucky habits. 

With the quantity of refuse thrown out of some 
thirty thousand houses daily the city of Kabul would 
soon become impossible to live in, but for the 
scavenging work done by the dogs and crows, who 

45 



Under the Absolute Amir 

are the unconscious remedy of the evil, and prevent 
the city becoming uninhabitable. I was told that 
one of the former Amirs had all bazar dogs killed, 
and the occasion was remembered, because soon after- 
wards a bad epidemic of cholera visited the city. The 
present Amir also gave orders for all bazar dogs to 
be killed, and the bulk of them were despatched, and 
then a few months later the cholera epidemic of 1903 
broke out and was noted for its virulence. 



46 



CHAPTER IV 

KABUL continued 

How streets are governed City magistrate Robberies and murders 
Bazar shops Style of palaces and better-class houses Climate of 
Kabul. 

EACH kochee or bazar in Kabul (streets with or with- 
out shops are called bazars) has a kilantar or head- 
man whose duty it is to report to the Kotwal (city 
magistrate) all births and deaths in his street, keep 
order among the inhabitants, see that the street is 
kept clean, and to govern it generally ; and he is 
held responsible for any lawlessness that occurs. 

Soon after the death of the late Amir there were 
many robberies in different parts of the city, and all 
efforts to trace the thieves were unavailing. In some 
cases a man who shut up his shop and house and 
spent the night with a friend would return home in 
the morning to find the whole contents of the shop 
looted. So many similar cases occurring it was evident 
that the thieves were well informed of the movements 
of the householder they intended robbing. In other 
cases the owners were awakened by the noise made, 
and in an endeavour to protect their property were 
wounded or killed by the thieves, and, at last, the 
inhabitants were in a state of terror, while in the 

47 



Under the Absolute Amir 

bazars nothing was talked of but the robberies and 
murders. The Amir was petitioned, and he offered 
a large reward to any one giving information of the 
robbers, but without result. 

Eventually, a shopkeeper who was sleeping, as is 
usual at night in fine weather, on the roof together 
with one of his relatives, both with swords on account 
of the fear prevailing, was awakened by two of the 
robbers stumbling over him after climbing up to the 
roof from the outside. He sprang up and raised an 
outcry, and his relative jumping up too, they made 
at the robbers with their swords ; but the latter, firing 
their pistols at them, ran off. The shopkeeper, although 
wounded, ran after them and managed to cut one of 
the men across the arm with his sword and then seized 
him, and in the struggle that ensued continued to call 
for help, until at length some neighbours hurried in 
and helped him to secure the thief. The relative, 
however, lay dead, shot through the heart. In the 
morning the robber was taken to the Kotwal who, by 
the Amir's order, applied different tortures in order to 
make him confess the names of his confederates. Some 
thirty names were so obtained, and the men were 
caught and made prisoners, and among them was 
a kilantar (headman) and one or two Kotwali sepoys 
(police). The latter, by giving the password of each 
night to the gang, had enabled them to pass the street 
guards without question, and made it easy for the 
robbers to visit any house they desired, and get back 
to their own houses before daybreak. 

' 



MJ'f in 




THE MIHMAX KHANA (GUEST-HOUSE), KABUL. 




PORTION OF GARDEN ATTACHED TO MY HOUSE SAINT*S GRAVE IN THE 
CORNER OF GARDEN. 

[7~o face p. 48. 



Kabul 

The houses where the stolen goods were stored 
were, also made known, and a large quantity of 
jewellery, carpets, shawls, copper utensils, and other 
articles were obtained, from which any of the persons 
robbed were allowed to take those articles belonging 
to them on giving proof of ownership. Of the robbers, 
five were blown from the gun, some were blinded, 
and the others were imprisoned for life. 

In Kabul a bugle sounds the " wardi " between 
eight and nine o'clock every night from each police 
station, and it is sounded again in the morning at 
sunrise. Between those hours no person is allowed 
to go about the streets without giving the pass- 
word for the night, and should any one be found 
who is unable to do so, he is detained in the guard- 
room until morning, when he is taken before the 
Kotwal, who fines or releases him according to the 
quality of the excuse given. 

The bazar shops are very small, the greater 
number of them being about a huckster's stall in 
size. The front of the shop is open, and at night 
it is shuttered and padlocked. There are no glass 
doors or windows, for glass is too rare and costly 
except for the Amir's palaces. The plinth of the 
wall projects in front of the shop into the street, 
and on this the shopkeeper sits, with his goods 
ranged on the floor and shelves of the room behind 
him. The goods offered for sale are principally 
grain, fruit, vegetables, sugar, and other provisions, 
cloth and cotton goods, shawls, boots, and articles of 

49 E 



Under the Absolute Amir 

apparel, leather goods, copper, tin, and iron utensils, 
etc. There are tea shops where a man can get a 
small pot of tea for less than a halfpenny, but if 
he takes sugar with it he has to pay about a farthing 
extra. 

In the bazars are also letter-writers, for the use 
of those who cannot write themselves, who charge 
a halfpenny to a penny for each letter written, the 
stamp, of course, being extra. The principal bazars 
are named after the article mostly sold there ; such 
as Gandam Farosh (wheat bazar), Zaghal Farosh 
(charcoal), Kunah Farosh (old curios), etc. Eevolver 
and rifle cartridges can be obtained also, but are 
expensive, ranging from two to four cartridges for 
a shilling, according to size and demand. 

The better-class houses are usually built of 
sun-dried brick and mud ; there is a good deal of 
wood-work about them, and sometimes the whole 
front of a house is built up of wood. There are 
two parts to each house. The inner part is the 
harem serai, where the women are quartered, and 
here the rooms are built in such form as to surround 
and look out upon an inner courtyard ; and an 
outer small house, which is built over the gate of 
the harem and overlooks the street, for the use of 
the man, and where male visitors are received and 
entertained by him. The largest houses have also 
a garden attached to them, which is surrounded by 
a high wall to insure privacy when the women walk 
in it, for no woman must allow her face to be seen 

50 



Kabul 

by any man excepting only her nearest relations. 
The door leading to the women's quarters in all 
houses has a kopchee or door-keeper, and no one 
is allowed to enter any house until its master has 
given permission, and no woman is allowed to leave 
the house unless the kopchee has been told by the 
master to permit it. 

The palaces of the Amir and princes are the only 
well-built houses in Kabul. The Amir's principal 
palace is Arak. Arak signifies " fort " in Turki, and 
"palace" in Persian. It is a large fortified place, 
some five hundred yards square, and is surrounded 
by a deep and wide moat. The surrounding walls 
are double and very thick. The outer walls are 
loop-holed for cannon and Maxims, while an earthen 
embankment, carried on arches connecting the two 
walls, is sloped up from above the embrasures to 
the inner wall, the top of which is slotted for rifle- 
men. Under this embankment are the rooms where 
the guns are worked. Inside the fort offices and 
storerooms are built up against the inner walls, 
together with rooms for the men of the garrison 
who form the Amir's bodyguard, and are specially 
selected and highly paid. In the Arak fort are also 
the public and private treasuries, and all the modern 
rifles and cartridges, of which there are many thou- 
sands, are kept in the storerooms there. The Amir's 
palace inside Arak, and the harem serai for his women, 
are both surrounded by a high wall, which forms an 
inner defence when so required, and besides these 



Under the Absolute Amir 

are other rooms for the Amir's use, which have 
lately been built alongside the north tower, and at 
other places inside the fort. The inner area of 
the fort is laid out as a garden, and at one end 
of the garden is a large glass-covered hothouse 
where the Amir sits very often in winter, sur- 
rounded by shrubs and flowers, and with bulbuls 
and other singing birds in cages suspended from the 
roof. 

Outside Arak are situated the Boistan and Guli- 
stan palaces. While of the summer palaces, Shahrara 
(city's adornment) lies about a mile to the north- 
west of the city, and a couple of miles further on 
lies Baghibala (high garden), which was the late 
Amir's favourite summer palace and where he died. 
More to the west, and about eighteen miles out of 
the city, is the summer palace at Paghman, a green 
spot at the foot of the Hindu Kush mountains. 
South of Kabul, and about one and a half miles 
from the city, is Baber, where another summer resi- 
dence has been built beside the tomb of Baber Shah, 
the first of the Moghul emperors, who was buried 
there in 1530. Six miles out in the same direction 
is Hindeki, where the present Amir has a summer 
palace, which he used before coming to the throne. 
A little to the south-west of Hindeki lies Kila 
Asham Khan, where the summer palace of the 
Queen-Sultana of the late Amir is situated. 

In the gardens outside Arak are two large salaam 
khana (audience chambers) which were built by the 

52 



Kabul 

late Amir to afford room for large public durbars. 
These, in addition to the audience chambers proper, 
have smaller rooms attached to them, and the late 
Amir was in the habit of spending several days 
together in the new salaam khana, which is a hand- 
some building. 

The Kabul climate is a good one, and very 
bracing. Situated as it is some seven thousand feet 
above sea level, the air is rare, and it is, of course, 
much colder than other places on the same latitude. 
At first, one experiences a little difficulty in breathing 
when walking uphill, and is inclined to doubt the 
efficiency of one's lungs, but this wears off afterwards. 
I once climbed up the Hindu Rush to the limit of 
the snow in summer, and found the air very exhila- 
rating and fresh ; but I had to stop frequently to 
recover breath, and the air I breathed seemed alto- 
gether insufficient and not satisfying, like that at 
a lower altitude. 

Although there is usually very little rainfall, 
during two of the summers I spent in Kabul, 
thunder storms, with heavy downfalls of rain, were 
frequent. In these storms the flashes of lightning 
were almost continuous and the peals of thunder 
were deafening, and without cessation ; but the 
electricity was expended on the heights close to 
the city, and there are very few cases on record 
of a house being struck. 

In the winter heavy falls of snow are common, 
and when the wind drifts it, the smaller houses are 

53 



Under the Absolute Amir 

sometimes covered. After a fall of snow, hazara 
and other labourers are called in with their wooden 
shovels to clear it off the roofs, as it would otherwise 
melt when the sun came out, and, percolating the 
mud covering, make the rooms below uninhabitable, 
and the added weight of snow is often the cause of 
a roof falling in. The snow is shovelled off the roofs 
into the streets below, where it piles up and takes 
months to melt, and keeps the roadway near by in 
a muddy condition ; but the Afghan cares nothing 
for a little extra mud or dirt, and no one takes the 
trouble to clear away snow which will melt away 
itself in time that would indeed be wasted labour. 
Latterly, arrangements have been made for carting 
it away from the principal thoroughfares, and in time 
the people may see the advantage of clearing all 
thoroughfares alike. 

When the summer is dry, dust storms are of 
almost daily occurrence, and are very unpleasant 
when one is out walking or riding, and in the house 
it is also unpleasant, for all doors and windows have 
to be kept shut, and the rooms become very hot, 
and everything one touches has a gritty feel. In hot 
weather the air is usually still until about three in 
the afternoon, and then a wind rises, blowing from the 
north, and, coming in gusts and eddies downwards, 
lifts up columns of dust so effectively that in a short 
time it is difficult to see, and this wind continues to 
increase in violence until about an hour after sun- 
down, when it gradually dies away, and then, in the 

54 



Kabul 

stillness that follows, the noises of the night sound 
very loud. 

The winter of 1901-02 was an exceptional one, 
for no snow fell the whole of the winter. I was 
told of a similar winter about twelve years before, 
which had been followed by cholera, and in this case 
history repeated itself, for in the spring the rivers 
and streams from the mountains dried up, the crops 
failed for want of water, and famine set in, and in 
the summer following, when food was scarcest, 
cholera broke out and raged for three months, and 
owing to the impoverished bodies of the people, the 
mortality was exceptionally high. 

During the winter the days are mostly bright, 
and the sun shines brilliantly on the snow, causing 
it to thaw. In the evenings it freezes again, and 
then the roads are like polished glass, and men, 
horses, and camels fall and are injured, the animals 
often breaking their legs and having to be destroyed. 
The sun, shining on the snow, also causes a good 
deal of snow blindness. But the most trying time 
in winter is when the skies are overcast, and a great 
wind rises which nothing will shut out of the house. 
Then at sundown the temperature falls below zero, 
and continues to fall as the night advances, and even 
with a huge fire burning in the room, one is warm 
only on the side nearest the fire, the other side of the 
body being chilled with the continuous draught 
which comes in at every crevice as the wind surges 
against the house in seeming heavy waves. Those 

55 



Under the Absolute Amir 

outeide who have to bear the brunt of this wind, 
suffer considerably, and often lose feet, hands, or nose 
with frost-bite, and soldiers on guard frequently die 
of cold, for they are very insufficiently clad to stand 
such weather. At this time, too, wolves come down 
at night from the mountains, driven by hunger from 
their natural fastnesses to seek food near the city, 
and attack and kill men whom they find helpless 
with cold and fatigue, and carry off children, sheep, 
and goats when they can get them. 

One peculiarity about the climate is the quantity 
of electricity in all things. If one walks across a 
room in the dark, dragging the feet along the carpet, 
sparks of electricity follow the feet ; also, if one 
strokes a dog smartly down the back, the same thing 
is noticeable. When undressing, the shirt, as it is 
pulled over the head, causes a crackle of electricity 
as it drags over the hair, and women, when brushing 
their long tresses, find each hail? electrified and 
standing out straight from one another as the brush 
leaves it. 

The clear, rare air makes distances very deceptive 
to the eye, and mountains at a considerable distance 
appear quite close. Once, when riding one of the 
longest day's journeys I have done in the country, 
I was told in the morning that we should camp 
under a conically-shaped mountain in the distance, 
which could be seen rising between the dip of two 
ranges of mountains, and, looking at it, I put the 
distance down at twenty to twenty-five miles, and 

56 



Kabul 

looked forward to early lunch that day ; but evening 
was well advanced before we reached our camping- 
ground, and we travelled at a steady pace the whole 
of the day. 

The clear atmosphere also makes the moonlight 
very brilliant, and the effect of the sleeping city 
bathed in the white light of the moon as seen from 
the roof of the house at night, the harsh outlines of 
houses and mountains toned down, and the domes 
of palaces and tombs rising above the other buildings 
is very beautiful. Day dispels the illusion, for the 
clear atmosphere and absence of vapour makes the 
colouring of the landscape very dull, and the brilliant 
green of the trees here and there appears objection- 
able as out of keeping with the rest of the colour 
scheme. 



57 



CHAPTER V 

MANNERS AND CUSTOMS 

Belief in the supernatural Dress of men Complexion Character of 
people Description of various tribes Languages and schools 
Feuds between families How holidays are spent by the people 
Singing and musical instruments Games and amusements. 

SPEAKING generally, there is much in the daily life 
and customs of the Afghans that reminds one of 
England some three hundred years ago as depicted 
in books and histories, such as their superstitions, 
their treatment of sick persons by barber surgeons 
and leech wives, their belief in ghosts, devils, and 
fairies, in fortune-tellers, in people with the evil 
eye, in the astrologers who cast their horoscopes, 
and their fervent belief generally in the super- 
natural. In many other particulars also they 
resemble the old English, but in character they differ 
considerably. 

The dress of the country is of course the Afghan 
costume, which consists of tombons or loose pyjama 
trousers made of many yards of cotton material 
which hang in folds from the hips, round which they 
are tied with a pyjama string, a plain shirt which 

58 



Manners and Customs 

is worn outside the tombons, and over the shirt 
an armless coat (very much like a waistcoat) which 
is usually worn unbuttoned ; a large sheet of calico 
is worn loosely round the neck like a shawl with 
one end carelessly thrown over the shoulder. The 
turban is the conical fez, with lungi wrapped tightly 
round it over the head, and the shoes more resemble 
slippers in shape, they are very heavy and studded 
with nails while the toes curl up over the foot. 
Stockings or socks are only worn by the well-to-do 
people. 

Officials and those attached to the court, together 
with officers of the army, wear the English style of 
clothes, those attached to the court having long frock- 
coats similar to the Turkish, and wear fez of black 
cloth which are straight, instead of sloping up to the 
crown like the ordinary Turkish fez. Officers of the 
army wear uniforms fashioned after the style of 
the English army with flat peaked caps of the 
German pattern. 

The soldiers are dressed variously, some wearing 
the Afghan tombons and others English trousers, or 
white cotton pants cut in the same style, but all 
have English pattern tunics or coats, and a leather 
belt carrying pouches strapped round the body. 
For head-dress, some wear the usual turban and 
some flat peaked caps. Soldiers may, in fact, dress 
as they like or can, except on review days, when 
their uniform (they have but one) must be worn. 
The soldiers of the Amir's bodyguard have uniforms 

59 



Under the Absolute Amir 

for everyday wear, and all are dressed and armed 
in the same style. 

Most of the people who possess a horse wear 
long Eussian boots with high heels, which give a 
perched up appearance to the legs ; but whatever 
style of dress may be worn there is always a leather 
belt strapped round the body, in which knives and 
revolvers are carried, provided the man is fortunate 
enough to possess a revolver. Merchants who travel 
up and down between Kabul and India buy up 
stocks of old uniforms ; these are much prized by 
the poorer Kabulis, for they wear well and are cheap, 
so that one sees all sorts of British regimental tunics, 
besides those of the police and railways, and it looks 
strange to see a man walking along the street with 
the letters " S. E. Ky," or those of another railway 
company on his collar, so many miles away from the 
place where it was first worn. Generally the Kabuli 
wears clothes made after the English fashion, and 
those who cannot afford a good sort of material for 
their dress do the best they can, and are to be seen 
with the tombons and shoes of the Afghan, and an 
English coat, or a suit cut in the English style, and 
Afghan shoes, and no socks or stockings. When I 
speak of the English coat or trousers, I do not mean 
that the clothes are English made, for the bazar 
tailors are clever enough to imitate the English 
style sufficiently well to satisfy their patrons, and 
the tailor who can cut clothes to fit well is in great 
demand, and soon becomes a well-to-do person. 

60 



Manners and Customs 

In complexion the people vary considerably, some 
being very dark skinned, and others as fair as 
Europeans. Those with dark skins are, as a rule, 
Kabulis who have no objection to marrying the 
women of southern nations, but the true Afghans 
from the hills are very fair, and often with light- 
coloured hair, and as they despise women of other 
nations they seldom marry any but those of their own 
people. In many of the Afghans red cheeks give a 
greater impression of fairness. Usually the hair is 
black, and hangs straight and lank, and men whose 
hair and beard go grey from old age or other reasons, 
but who feel young enough to take other wives to 
themselves for they marry as many as they can 
support dye their hair and beard a deep black, but 
as the dye is not permanent it has to be frequently 
renewed ; otherwise it fades, and the hair and beard 
become a dirty red and look very unprepossessing. 
This is often seen in men whose continued duty, or 
journey to some distant place, prevents them seeking 
the services of their hairdresser, who is usually one of 
the women of the household. It is only very old 
men indeed who are seen in Kabul with grey hair 
and beards, for personal vanity is one of the leading 
characteristics of the Afghan, and this influences him 
to spend more than he ought on dress in order to 
appear well, the food for himself and family being 
of diminished quantity in consequence, very often, 
indeed, near to starvation point. I have known well- 
dressed men who lived chiefly on dry bread, and not 

61 



Under the Absolute Amir 

too much of that, in order to save the bulk of their 
income for new clothes. 

It has been said that the Afghans are the Lost 
Tribes of Israel, and there is much in the appearance 
of the true Afghan to support this theory, and in 
character and name also. The hooked nose, deep-sunk 
piercing eyes, and general features are distinctly Jewish, 
while those who have had business relations with the 
Afghans will vouch for the character, and then the 
names, Suleiman, Yakoob, Yusef, Daood (Solomon, 
Jacob, Joseph, David), etc., are common names. 
Some mountains in the country also have Jewish 
names, such as the Koh-i-Suleiman, so that one is 
inclined to think that if they are not the Lost Tribes, 
they must be of Jewish origin. 

The Kabulis are hybrid creatures, compounded of 
many races, and generally having the worst character- 
istics of each. In complexion they vary considerably, 
but, as a whole, are fair as compared with the 
Hindustanis, and some have grey and blue eyes and 
light hair. Among them are those of villainous 
countenance, and others just as handsome, both in 
face and form. They are generally short of stature 
as compared with the Afghans, who are tall and 
well-built men ; but the conditions of life among the 
hillmen are such that the weakly die young, and 
it is a case of the survival of the fittest, which, so 
far as the physical effect on the race is concerned, is 
worthy of emulation by other races. 

The Kandaharis are also a good type of Afghan, 

62 



Manners and Customs 

and are mostly strong well-built men. Grey and blue 
eyes are common amongst them, as with the Kabulis ; 
but whether this is natural to them or the result of 
the English occupation of the country on two occasions 
many years ago, is problematical. 

The people of Turkestan and the Usbegs are rather 
Mongolian in feature, the type being in some more 
pronounced than others. The Hazaras, whom Amir 
Abdur Rahman brought into subjection, are decidedly 
Mongolian in feature, and are mostly short, squat, 
strongly built people. 

Another race the late Amir subjugated, the Kafris j 
are entirely distinct from the other races of the 
country. They are generally very fair complexioned, 
and have light-coloured eyes. They are not tall, and 
are slimly yet symmetrically built. In many cases 
their features are Grecian in type, and it is quite con- 
ceivable that they are, as has been suggested, the 
descendants of the garrisons Alexander the Great left 
in the country on his historic march to India. They 
were idolaters until the Amir took them in hand and 
converted them by fire and sword, and they have 
little love for their new masters. They are quick and 
intelligent, and make good workmen. 

The language of the country is Pushtoo, which is 
general among the people from Peshawar to Kandahar. 
The Turkestanis use the Turki language, and the 
Kafris have a language of their own, which latter 
might form an interesting study for those who are 
acquainted with the old Greek language. All people 

63 



Under the Absolute Amir 

of any consequence speak Persian, which is the court 
language, and the language used in Kabul itself, for 
very few of the Kabulis are able to speak Pushtoo, 
and with a knowledge of Persian one can get on any- 
where in the country, but it is less common among 
the frontier tribes than elsewhere. 

Persian is the language taught in the schools, 
which the children attend from early morning until 
about ten o'clock, and again in the late afternoon for 
a couple of hours. In these schools the master, 
usually a moullah, sits on a carpet in the centre of 
the room with the children in a circle round him, 
sitting cross-legged, with their books on their knees, 
and reading aloud in a sing-song manner, while 
rocking! their bodies backwards and forwards. This 
rocking the body to and fro while reading becomes 
such a habit that in after life very few men can read 
anything without doing it, and their voices take on 
the sing-song intonation of the school. For the 
chastisement of the unruly and stupid, the master has 
a pliable rod by him. There is no sparing the rod 
and spoiling the child, and when the master wishes 
to punish one of them, the small offender is held on 
his back, with his legs up in the air, and receives so 
many cuts on the soles of his feet, and while the 
punishment lasts he howls piteously. Sometimes in 
passing by a school I have stopped, thinking a child 
was surely being murdered, until I saw the reason 
why the boy was howling, and my standing to watch 
generally had the effect of stopping the child's noise, 

64 



Manners and Customs 

for the " Feringhee " is one of the names used to 
frighten children with. One end of the room in 
which school is held has no wall, and is open on the 
side facing the road, so there is nothing to prevent 
one watching the school children at work. 

Children are also taught in the school to read the 
old Arabic, in order that they may read the Koran, 
but while there are many men who can read Arabic, 
there are few who understand it, and fewer still, if 
any, who can speak it as a language. Many can 
recite passages from the Koran as a parrot would do, 
and some, who are thereby called Hafiz, can recite it 
from memory from beginning to end. 

In character the people are idle, luxurious, and 
sensual, which characteristics become prominent as 
soon as a man possesses power or money (almost 
synonymous terms in Afganistan). They are capricious 
and ungrateful, and turn easily in their likes and 
dislikes, and are readily led to turn against those to 
whom they owe gratitude. Usually, when they want 
anything, they want it at once, and should their 
desire be delayed for any time, they no longer want 
it. They are lying, treacherous, and vengeful, and 
one who has a grudge or enmity against another will 
not show it openly, but conceals his feelings and 
feigns friendship, while waiting the opportunity for 
vengeance, and in the execution of their vengeance 
they are capable of unheard-of cruelties. They are 
readily ruled by fear, but are apt to brood over small 
grievances until they convince themselves that they 

6 5 F 



Under the Absolute Amir 

are most cruelly treated, and then their feelings may 
result in a fit of Berserk rage, under the influence of 
which they lose control of themselves and take 
vengeance violently, often stabbing and hacking at 
their victim long after life is extinct. They are cruel 
and insensible to the pain of others, often laughing 
at it, and, except in the case of a relative, will seldom 
go out of their way to relieve suffering. 

Towards their children they are too kind, and 
spoil them while they are young, denying them 
nothing which it is possible to give them, and dress- 
ing them in gaudy clothes while they themselves go 
ragged. They make no attempt to correct them for 
any wrong-doing, laughing at it rather as a sign of 
precociousness, and among the Kabulis it is a common 
thing for a little child to be able to curse fluently, 
and their curses are often directed at their parents. 
This neglect in training the young properly accounts 
for much that is objectionable in the character of the 
people. It is not until children are seven or eight 
years old that they begin to correct them, but a good 
deal of the character of a child is at that age already 
formed. 

The Afghans are for ever scheming one against 
another, family against family, official against official, 
farmer against farmer, workman against workman, 
and wife against wife the latter being, naturally, one 
of the evils which arise from the custom of plurality 
of wives. The result of all this scheming is often a 
quarrel which ends in a fight, in which one or other 

66 



Manners and Customs 

of the parties may be killed ; they do not always use 
knife or bullet for the purpose, they have other ways 
too of ridding themselves of an enemy. 

In the cities, when a man commits murder, he is 
taken charge of and judged by the authorities, but in 
the country it often results in a feud between the two 
families, which is carried on for generations, the 
murderer being waited for by the relatives of the 
man whom he killed, and killed in turn ; the slayer 
in this case also being eventually slain by a member 
of the opposite party, and so the feud goes on for 
many years. 

Illustrating the vengeful character of the people, 
I may mention the case of a man who killed another 
and escaped to his own house or fort, as it is called 
by them, each house being in the nature of a strong- 
hold. Here he stayed for some thirty years, without 
venturing to put his foot outside the house ; but at 
the end of that time, supposing the watchfulness of 
his enemies had slackened, he went out one day, 
and was carried back dead. The vengeance of the 
relatives of the man he had killed had not slum- 
bered, neither had their watchfulness. It is said 
that revenge is sweet, but it seems to have an added 
sweetness to these people. 

There is a law among the people that a man who 
has been apprehended by the authorities for murder, 
may be claimed by the murdered man's relatives to 
execute or forgive as they wish. The relatives may 
then accept so much blood-money as compensation, or 



Under the Absolute Amir 

may kill the man in any way they like. Sometimes 
the haggling among the relatives about accepting 
the blood-money offered by the murderer and his 
friends, some being in favour of accepting the money, 
and others in favour of death, is continued even under 
the scaffold, where the condemned one stands ready 
pinioned, and with the rope round his neck, and 
after, perhaps, an hour or so of wrangling, it ends in 
the decision that the man must suffer death, and then 
the rope is seized and the man hauled up. The 
feelings of the man during the altercation in such 
cases must be unenviable. 

Another case which further shows the vengeful 
character of the people is that of a man who 
murdered a boy, and was handed over to the relatives 
for execution or forgiveness. The mother of the boy 
resisted those in favour of blood-money, and insisted 
on the man's throat being cut, as he cut her son's, 
and when this was done, she, in the frenzy of her 
vengeance, actually drank the blood as it flowed from 
the man's throat. 

The amusements of the people are simple, and 
would lead one to suppose them rather simple-minded, 
if one did not know them. For instance, in the early 
evening, when work is over, the people will flock in 
summer-time to the public garden, where plots are 
laid out with flowers, each plot having one kind of 
flower only, carrying with them their singing-birds 
in cages, and will sit round these plots until night- 
fall, contentedly enjoying the scent of the flowers 

68 



Manners and Customs 

and the cool evening breeze. They sit there quietly, 
and for the most part silently, and there is no noise 
beyond the pit-pat of the slippers of those going and 
coming on the garden paths. At one or two corners 
of the garden walks are tea-sellers, with a little crowd 
of people squatting round drinking tea out of the 
small handleless cups commonly used, and taking a 
pull at the chillum (pipe similar to a hookah) now 
and then. 

On Fridays (the Sundays of the Mussulmans), 
and on holidays, many people go off walking or on 
horse or donkey, when, in many cases, they ride two 
together on one animal, and sometimes three, to the 
gardens in the country, taking food and cooking-pots 
with them ; and there they will wander round the 
gardens until midday, content to be amongst the 
trees and flowers. Then they cook their food, and 
after eating that, they lie about and chat, or doze 
the afternoon away, and when evening begins to 
gather, they get their belongings together, and start 
off home again, having had a glorious day's outing, 
according to their own statement. They are easy to 
please in this way, and anything which brings them 
fresh air, sunlight, flowers, and grass or trees, and no 
worry or duty, and, if possible, a little to eat and 
drink while enjoying it all, is a day's tamasha to be 
talked over and retailed to others, and dreamt about 
until the next opportunity comes. 

When other means of amusement fail, they sit 
together on the roof of the house, or in some quiet 



Under the Absolute Amir 

spot near by, where there may be a tree to shade them, 
and one of them plays the rubarb, which is something 
like a mandoline, and sings Persian love-songs. Out 
of half a dozen men there is usually one who can 
play and sing, and their songs sound best at a little 
distance, for if close by the nasal intonation is not 
prepossessing, while the contortions of the mouth 
and face in bringing out the tremulous and pro- 
longed high notes rather fascinate one, and the song 
is forgotten in watching them and waiting for the 
breakdown, which seems momentarily imminent. 
There are others of their stringed instruments which 
resemble the banjo in shape, but all are called 
"rubarb." The music has little change about it, 
and differs from ours in not being composed of 
different airs, but in being of bars of four to six 
beats, which are repeated over and over again. It 
sounds very monotonous, and is a little trying, until 
one gets used to it, and then, on a still summer 
evening, the rubarb in the distance has rather a 
soothing sound in its monotony, if one happens to 
be reclining in an easy-chair, smoking and resting 
after dinner. But if one is busy writing, or is 
absorbed in calculations, or anything of that sort, 
the monotony of the sound is very trying, and 
produces a desire to make a change at any cost, 
even if a shot-gun is necessary to effect it. 

The people are like the rest of the; Orientals, and 
do not look upon exercise in any form as an amuse- 
ment, and therefore, are not in the habit of dancing 

70 



Manners and Customs 

as a means of recreation and pleasure, but they 
have, instead, properly trained dancing-girls to do 
so before them. The services of the dancing-girls 
are requisitioned only on festivals and weddings, 
or when some wealthy man gives an entertainment 
to his friends on the occasion of a visit from one 
of the princes or some high official person. 

The dancing-girls are accompanied by men with 
musical instruments who form the orchestra, and 
among the instruments is the inevitable tom-tom or 
drum, which is played by being struck with the 
fingers or the hand, and not with drumsticks. The 
life of the dancing-girl is a hard one, for the dancing 
they practice is exhausting, and induces a good deal 
of perspiration, and the girl is clad in light flimsy 
muslin, while the nights even in summer are chill, 
and all doors and windows are open to the breeze. 
Consequently, she catches cold and gets fever and 
continues to get it, for she must practice her pro- 
fession whenever called upon, so that it is not a 
matter for surprise that these girls mostly die of 
consumption. The dancing-girls in Kabul are Hindu- 
stanis, from the Peshawar and Dehli districts, while 
some are the offspring of former dancing-girls and 
the men of the country. Although much has been 
said about the Oriental dancing- girls' poetry of 
motion, and I have seen many others in different 
parts of India, their action during the dance appears 
very studied and wanting in grace, even with the 
best of them, and none that I have seen are to be 



Under the Absolute Amir 

compared with our own principal ballet-dancers for 
grace of movement. 

Among wild Afghan tribes, such as the Jidrani 
and others, knife-dances are indulged in. About 
fifty men arrange themselves in a circle with four or 
five more in the centre, who beat tom-toms and tam- 
bourines, and play on stringed instruments. The 
dance commences by the men springing forward 
towards the centre of the circle and back again, 
flashing their knives about over their heads, and 
singing in time to the music in a low tone, but 
gradually the music, singing, and dancing become 
louder and quicker, belts and turbans are thrown 
off to allow of greater freedom of movement, and the 
knives flash more rapidly, until at last the men seem 
in a very frenzy, and the dancing becomes a series of 
wild leaps in the air, knives are thrown up and 
caught again, and the singing changes to a chorus of 
wild yells. When the dance has reached its most 
frenzied point, it suddenly ceases, and then there is a 
loud clapping of hands by the dancers, and all is 
over. 

They have another wild dance which resembles 
some strange rite of worshippers round a fetish. Two 
or three men with tom-toms sit together, and the 
dancers arrange themselves in a large circle round 
them, but instead of facing towards the centre of the 
circle as in the former dance, each man faces the one 
in front of him. When the tom-toms begin, they 
spring forward a step and stop momentarily, then 

72 



Manners and Customs 

spring forward again on the other foot, and so con- 
tinue, but during each spring they turn violently 
half round to right or left as each foot advances, and 
the sudden twist they give their bodies sends their 
turbans or caps flying after the first few steps. In a 
little while, when they begin to warm up to the 
dance, they do a whole turn in the air during each 
spring forward, and, as this is continued, the dancers 
become more and more energetic, until their hair, 
which is worn long and cut straight round the 
shoulders, stands out like a mop being wrung out as 
they spin round. Their arms, being also extended 
at the same time, the whole effect, as they spin 
round more rapidly and violently and the tom-toms 
beat quicker, is exceedingly quaint. 

Some of the people, mostly soldiers, go in for 
swordstick combats. The swordsticks are similar to 
the English ones, with basket guards, but the com- 
batants carry small round leather shields in addition, 
which are held in the left hand, and not partly on 
the forearm, as is usual with larger shields. Some 
of the men are very expert in this exercise, but they 
do very little guarding by means of the swordstick, 
and catch most of the blows on the shield, for this 
allows of a quicker return stroke. They are also much 
in favour of leaping back to avoid a leg-cut, leaning 
forward as they do so to get in a down-stroke at 
their adversary's head. 

In the late spring of each year, the " Jubah " 
takes place. The jubah is a fair combined with 

73 



Under the Absolute Amir 

sports, and is held on a level strip of plain under the 
Asman heights south-west of the city. Here they have 
horse races, but the races are arranged on the spur of 
the moment between one man and another, and are 
not agreed on beforehand to determine the best of 
several horses over a fixed course. Food and toy- 
stalls are erected along the slopes of the hill, and all 
Kabul and its children turn out for the three days 
the fair is held. On these occasions the people put 
on their best clothes, and the children are particularly 
gaudy in their coloured velvet coats and caps. The 
children's toys are very quaint in appearance. The 
dolls are made of stuffed rag, and are dressed in 
Afghan fashion, and represent both men and women, 
not children, while others represent demons. Then 
there are small windmills fixed on the end of a stick, 
and wooden whistles, and many other curiously shaped 
articles, all gorgeously coloured, which children love. 
There is also a Turkestani tight-rope walker dressed 
in a gaily coloured fantastic costume, who fits up 
two long poles with a rope between, both poles and 
rope being very solidly made and very firmly fixed, 
and gives displays thereon. 

The jubah is also made the occasion for deciding 
the wrestling contests between the chief " pulwans " 
(athletes) of the city. These wrestling matches are 
usually conducted before the Amir and the princes, 
for whom tents are erected on the hillside, and the 
Amir awards money prizes to the victors. The 
keenest interest is taken in the wrestling by all 

74 



Manners and Customs 

people, and among the competitors defeat is in some 
cases so taken to heart that the man will never wrestle 
again, and others have been known to become so de- 
pressed through being beaten as to commit suicide. 

There is no course kept open for those who are 
racing their horses, and the riders have to dodge in 
and out amongst the people and other horses and 
donkeys as best they can, and often man and horse 
come to grief, chiefly over a donkey which gets out 
of the way of no one, unless under compulsion. On 
one occasion two men were racing their horses from 
opposite ends of the plain, and met midway, and as 
neither would give way to the other in passing they 
collided, and the result was that one man and horse 
were killed on the spot, and the other two died the 
following day. 

Story-tellers are in great favour among the people, 
and a good raconteur may be sure of an attentive 
audience. The bazar story-teller takes up his stand 
in a busy thoroughfare, and begins telling his story. 
In a short time he is surrounded by a large crowd, 
eagerly drinking in the various episodes related, 
while people riding or walking past have difficulty in 
squeezing their way through the crowd, if they them- 
selves do not stop to swell it ; but nothing is said or 
done by the passers-by to disturb the story-teller in 
his recital of the adventures of the prince or princess 
among the various jinn, fairies, or " deoo " (demons) 
of old time. Story-tellers are also attached to the 
retinues of the Amir and the princes, and others of 

75 



Under the Absolute Amir 

high standing. All their attendants and officials are 
story-tellers in a way ; but those mentioned are 
special men, whose chief duty it is to tell stories to 
their masters while the latter lie on their beds at 
night and listen until they fall asleep. 

In Kabul, when a guest is invited to dinner, the 
invitation means that he is expected to stop the 
night in the house of his host, and on these occasions, 
when the dinner has been despatched, the guests 
gather round the host, squatting or lying on carpets 
while they smoke the chillum, and each one takes 
his turn at telling a story. The interest in the 
stories related is so great that they often sit listening 
to one another far into the night, and are unfit for 
work the following day. 

Boys and children amuse themselves in much the 
same way as English children. The chief game 
among boys is " toop bazee," which is played with 
a flat piece of wood and a ball, and is very much 
like rounders. They also go in for wrestling, and 
fencing with sticks, and throwing arrows with a 
piece of string, at which they are rather expert. 
Some of the elder boys shoot sparrows and small 
birds with clay pellets from a long blow-pipe, and 
in order to get the birds at close range the boy 
takes his stand beneath a tree and uses a call which 
imitates a number of sparrows chirruping and fight- 
ing together, and this induces the sparrows to come 
and investigate the cause of trouble, when they offer 
a good target from below. 



Manners and Customs 

Smaller children play with balls, knuckle bones, 
marbles, and walnuts. The walnuts are used as in 
a game of marbles, and any knocked out of the ring, 
in which each player places a certain number, are 
the property of the player who knocks them out. 

Only very little girls are to be seen in the streets, 
as at about eight years of age they become " purdah/' 
i.e. no longer to be seen by men other than their 
relatives, and are confined to the women's quarters 
of the house, and cannot go outside unless wearing 
the " bukra," or cotton overdress, which covers them 
from head to foot, and has a slit covered with fine 
lace in front of the eyes for them to see through. 
Little girls may be seen sometimes on the house- 
top playing at a game similar to ring-of-roses, or 
playing with their dolls, and keeping house, or keep- 
ing shop, and other games of make-believe, which 
their sex delight in. Their greatest delight is to 
have an English doll with English clothes, for their 
own dolls are made of rag and dressed like them- 
selves. 



77 



CHAPTER VI 

MANNERS AND CUSTOMS continued 

Superstitions, fairies, and devils A curious legend Astrologers Children 
singing prayers on roofs to avert calamity Different foods in use 
Smoking and tobacco The Amir's chief physician Snuff Method 
of keeping warm in winter How time is kept Weddings of different 
classes Funerals. 

THE people are very superstitious, and firmly believe 
in ghosts, spirits, fairies, and devils, and most of 
their stories are about these good and evil spirits, 
as they term them, while their belief in them is 
such that even men are chary of going about alone 
at night. If a man is met at night walking alone 
one generally first hears him and then sees him, for 
he makes a good deal of noise as he walks, and also 
whistles or sings as he goes along. 

When I was stopping at the Mihman khana, I 
came in late one night, having been for several 
hours with the Amir, and while walking up to the 
house from the gate, I noticed one of the syces 
(grooms) coming from the house towards me, and 
making a prodigious noise, whistling. He stopped 
whistling when he saw me, and I wondered why he 
was so noisy, such being unusual, but when I got to 
my rooms I found the reason to be a nervous shock 
he had had. It appeared that one of my Hindustani 

78 



Manners and Customs 

servants, while in a facetious mood, had blacked 
his face, or rather made it more black with burnt 
cork, and whitened his lips and made white circles 
round his eyes. Then, taking two sheepskin coats, 
he had reversed them so that the hair was outside, 
and putting his legs through the sleeves of one and 
his arms through the sleeves of the other, had 
fastened both round his waist, and then put on a 
sheepskin cap with long hair. He dressed up after- 
wards to show me, and his appearance was not pre- 
possessing. A guard of seven men was stationed 
in the vestibule outside the door of my rooms, and 
to these he came on hands and knees until quite 
close, and then he started bounding towards them 
with huge roars. Thinking that a real deoo (demon) 
was on them, every man flung away rifle and sheep- 
skin coat, which is a heavy one, and fled wildly to 
the guardroom at the outer gate ; but one man, who 
was asleep when the rest fled, woke up with the 
noise and rose to a sitting position, staring round- 
eyed at the apparition and booing, until he regained 
enough consciousness to get up and fly. The demon 
then went to the small room adjoining the verandah, 
where the chaeedar's quarters were (the man who 
makes the tea). The chaeedar was sitting alone in 
deep thought, on a small carpet with his back to 
the window, which was open, but when this appari- 
tion came through the door, he rose up and sprang 
backwards through the window, regardless of possible 
injury to himself or anything else, save that he 

79 



Under the Absolute Amir 

left the room immediately. The next people visited 
were those of the Amir's servants, who were appointed 
to look after my comforts, and were always in my 
sitting-room when on duty, and his appearance at 
one door was the signal for their wild flight through 
the other, chairs and tables being upset in the hurry 
to get out. He then visited the other servants in 
their quarters with great success, and it was soon 
after it was over, and all had gathered together 
again to relate their impressions and experience, that 
I came in and the tale was told to me. All those 
who had been frightened looked very sheepish, and 
each man was trying to prove that he ran because 
the other one did. However, the infection of fear 
spread even to the apparition, and for several nights 
after no one would go out, not even across the garden 
to their own quarters, unless some one was with 
them. 

Fairies are generally supposed to inhabit the lonely 
mountains around, and although they are believed to 
be, on the whole, a good sort, the people are more 
inclined to give them a wide berth than risk too 
much by loitering about those places the fairies are 
supposed to haunt. They are described as twelve to 
eighteen inches high, very fantastically dressed, and 
going about in a follow-my-leader manner, dancing 
and skipping as they go. They are believed to be 
afraid of men, and to hide themselves from them, and 
so are only seen by those who are in hiding or sleeping 
in out-of-the-way places. Of children they are said 

80 



Manners and Customs 

to have no fear, but it is unwise to let a child stray 
near their haunts, as it may be put under a spell, or 
perhaps changed for one of their own children, who is 
made to take the face and form of the stolen child, 
and then the changeling will bring all sorts of bad 
luck upon its foster-parents. 

The supernatural being the people dread most, and 
to whom they put down much that happens which 
cannot be satisfactorily explained, is the shaitan. 
Shaitans are demons who take many forms according 
to the fear or gift of exaggeration of the individual 
who thinks he has seen one. These beings they 
imagine may be behind any bush or boulder after 
sundown, and they also believe them capable of coming 
into the sleeping-room at night to frighten them into 
fits by their very ugliness, if nothing worse befalls, 
so the people sleep with head as well as body covered 
with blanket or rezai. They never sleep alone in 
a room, but several together, and many have been 
astonished when I told them that in my country 
each person has a separate room, if possible, and that 
children are put to sleep alone at night. They say it 
is not that they really fear a shaitan, for God is 
good, but they are not accustomed to sleeping alone, 
and, besides, it is unwise to be alone at night should 
a spirit happen to come in. 

One of my servants solemnly assured me one 
morning that the night before his charpoy (bedstead) 
was lifted from the floor and swung round the room 
with him on it until he felt giddy, and at the same 

81 G 



Under the Absolute Amir 

time he heard the most strange noises. He, however, 
admitted, on being questioned, that he kept his eyes 
firmly shut and saw nothing, and no doubt his head 
was wrapped close in the bedclothes. However, he 
wanted another room to sleep in, and refused to 
occupy that room again, and whether the other 
servants played him a trick or whether it was a 
bad attack of indigestion that troubled him I could 
not discover, but the room he slept in was afterwards 
used as a store-room by the other servants, and the 
name it acquired was sufficient to deter the servants 
who came after him from sleeping in it. 

Another time the ceiling-cloth of one of my office- 
rooms came down during the night. It is a common 
occurrence, because the earth that falls through 
between the rafters from the mud roofs brings a 
gradually increasing weight to bear on the ceiling- 
cloth, and it sags until the cloth, sooner or later, rips 
at the edges and comes down. When I went to see 
the damage done the men with me said that it was 
assuredly the work of a shaitan, for who else could 
do it with the windows bolted and the door locked ? 
To argue against logic like this was useless. 

Another story told me by an Afghan about 
shaitans was that one evening after visiting some 
friends, he had some distance to walk before getting 
home, and the road lay through a burial-ground 
(burial-grounds have no walls round them as in 
England). It was late when he got among the 
graves, and the thought of walking alone there made 

82 



Manners and Customs 

his flesh creep, but he kept on until he was nearly 
through, and then he saw little flames rise from the 
ground in front of him and flicker about. This terri- 
fied him, and he put on an extra spurt to get clear 
of the graves, when the figure of a man appeared 
in front. The sight of another man calmed him until, 
on coming closer to the figure, he saw that a shawl 
was wrapped round the head (shawls are commonly 
worn so at night when the air is chill), and the eyes in 
the face shone like two stars, while the nearer he got 
to the figure the taller it grew, until it loomed high 
above him, and then he turned and ran back. But 
the house he had left was much further away from 
where he then was than his own home, so after 
running for a time he determined to face the grave- 
yard again. But the same thing happened, only now, 
being in a frenzy to get out of it all, he made a dash 
to get past the figure, and, while doing so, he lost 
consciousness, and did not recover it until the early 
morning, when he found himself lying on the road, 
but just clear of the graves, and to that he attributed 
his salvation. 

Another Afghan told me that he was sleeping one 
night in the serai at Gundamak, when he awoke 
without knowing the reason of his waking, and sat 
up. Then one wall of the room he was in dis- 
appeared, and there on the ground beyond he saw a 
regiment of Gorawallahs (English soldiers) march 
past, but without making any noise, and their faces 
were white in the moonlight, and wore an awful look. 

83 



Under the Absolute Amir 

This man, too, lost consciousness until the morning, 
or rather, he said he did. 

The people have a curious legend about sponges. 
They say the English people take very large earthen 
jars, and set them on the highest peaks of the moun- 
tains, and conceal the pots by piling stones round 
them, so that only the mouth shows. They then 
hide themselves in the crevices of the rocks, and wait 
until the clouds settle on the mountain-top, and come 
slowly down to the jars. Then, when a small cloud 
is seen to enter the jar, one of the men comes 
cautiously from his hiding-place, and quickly puts 
the lid on, and fastens it there. The jar is allowed 
to remain closed for about three days, by which time 
the cloud is dead, after which the vessel is broken 
and the dead cloud is cut into pieces, and taken out 
and sold as sponge. The Persian name for "sponge " 
is the same as for " cloud," and perhaps this accounts 
for the legend. 

Astrologers do a good business among the people, 
and their forecasts as to the lucky days on which to 
commence a journey or some new work are implicitly 
believed. The Amir and the members of the royal 
family have their own astrologers, who are consulted 
as to the auspicious day on which to commence any 
matter of importance, besides being asked to read 
what the future contains, but their verdicts, or such 
of them that I have heard, are ambiguous, and 
capable of being read in more than one way a very 
necessary art for those who read the riddle of the 



Manners and Customs 

future for the Amir. The astrologers have also 
to interpret dreams, for dreams are looked upon as 
signs given to warn or guide people, and it was due 
to a dream that the present Amir divorced all his 
wives but the four allowed by the Koran. It is not 
all people who consider themselves capable of predict- 
ing the future who are treated with honour and 
amass wealth, as witness the case of three men from 
a distant part of the country, who were brought 
before the Amir for predicting that a great calamity 
was to visit the country on a certain date, some few 
months ahead, and who expected much from their 
voicing of the prophecy. The Amir's mood, which 
is always an uncertain quality, at the time the men 
were brought before him, was not inclined towards 
signs of evil portent, and he gave an order that the 
prophets be kept in prison until the date fixed by 
them for the happening of the calamity, and then, he 
said, they shall be rewarded if their words are 
shown to be true, but in the other event, death. 
The prophecy was not fulfilled, but the Amir's 
sentence was. 

The astrologers cast horoscopes, and tell fortunes 
with cards, and use other implements of the black art, 
for forecasting future events, and very rapidly make 
name and fortune, when once one of their prognosti- 
cations is fulfilled, for then all their utterances are 
treated as truth itself, and should at any time any of 
their further prognostications prove contrary to 
actual happenings, the people do not blame the 

85 



Under the Absolute Amir 

fortune-teller, but themselves instead, for the predic- 
tions being always more or less ambiguous, the people 
consider it their own misconstruction of his words 
which prevented them knowing what was about to 
happen. This sort of sophistry does not pertain to 
the credulous among Afghans alone. 

The superstitious and religious beliefs mingle, 
as they do in other countries, and should any one 
praise a child for any attribute of mind or body at 
once, " nam i Khuda " (God's name) must be said to 
avert the evil which open praise will beget. The 
evil eye is also supposed to be possessed by some 
persons, and God's name must be spoken to avert 
its calamitous effect. Curiously enough, those credited 
with the evil eye are not blamed for its possession, 
but are said to be unlucky. In like manner, those 
who are skilful in curing and healing the sick and 
maimed, are said to have a lucky hand. 

They have one custom which will commend itself 
to many, and that is, to collect the children on the 
roofs of the different houses, and there sing prayers 
in unison, for the averting of cholera, earthquakes, 
or other calamity, because the children, being more 
innocent than their elders, their prayers are supposed 
to be more readily listened to. The roofs of the houses 
are all close together, and it is pleasant to see the 
groups of children standing in lines on the different 
roofs, and listen to them singing the prayers with 
their clear young voices, and when the calamity to 
be averted is cholera, one rather hopes their prayers 

86 



Manners and Customs 

may be listened to, for cholera makes a several 
months' stay when it visits Kabul, and is a trying 
time for all concerned. 

The food of the majority of the people in Kabul 
is of a simple description, consisting, as it does, of 
dry bread, which is made into cakes, oval in shape, 
and about twelve inches long, by half an inch thick. 
Those who can afford it, take curds and cheese with 
the bread, and sometimes meat and vegetables made 
into a stew. The Chinese green tea is almost always 
taken with food and it is a very poor man who will 
not expend three pice (a halfpenny) on a pot of tea, 
even if cheese must be omitted from the bill of fare 
to afford it. In the summer-time fruit is plentiful 
and cheap ; vegetables too, and lettuce is grown in 
large quantities. Two pice (little more than a 
farthing) will procure enough fruit to make a good 
meal for a man, and in the season most of the people 
met with on the streets are to be seen eating fruit, 
lettuce, or rhubarb, which latter grows wild in the 
mountains. 

Very poor people live mostly on mulberries, 
which they also dry for winter consumption. Many 
of the Hazaras, who are a saving people, live on 
nothing else during the summer months, and cases 
of broken limbs through falling from the trees while 
gathering mulberries, are common. A diet of mul- 
berries induces fever, particularly in those persons 
not accustomed to them, and the fever is of a serious 
nature, and many die of it. 

87 



Under the Absolute Amir 

The Koochee people, a sort of gipsy race who 
have no fixed home, but constantly travel about the 
country with their cattle and camels, and do a trade 
carrying goods and merchandise from place to place, 
and who are a most hardy race, live on corn bread, 
sheep and goat milk, cheese, and grass, eating the 
latter uncooked. Spinach, which grows wild, is also 
largely eaten by them, as well as by the other people 
of the country. 

The food of the Afghans of the villages is 
principally soup and bread with curds, sour milk, 
butter-milk, and fruit. Butter-milk is a particular 
favourite with them, and an Afghan can drink a very 
fair quantity of it at a sitting. 

If a camel, cow, or other esculent animal is sick, 
and it is certain that it is dying, the throat is cut, 
and the customary prayer said to make it halal (lawful 
eating), and the meat is then sold or eaten by the 
owners. I once saw a dying camel, that looked all 
skin and bone, being goaded along the bank of the 
river to the city that he might be killed close to the 
market for the better disposal of the meat, and it 
seemed as though the poor animal might topple over 
and die at any moment and cheat his master. There 
is little compassion in the bowels of an Afghan. 

The better classes and well-to-do people eat of 
many savoury dishes, of which the principal are pilau 
and kabob ; the latter being meat well peppered and 
salted, and roasted on a skewer over a fire (a roast leg 
of mutton is also a kabob). The pilau are of different 

88 



"!>.- l*,K 




Manners and Customs 

sorts, and are composed of rice, spices, and meat ; the 
rice and meat being stewed separately and mixed 
together on a dish. Preserves, pickles, sweetmeats, 
fruit, bread, are also eaten, and the ever present tea 
is taken to wind the meal up with, and with the tea 
the chillum is handed round, that tobacco may put 
the crowning touch on all. Large quantities of tea 
are consumed daily by the Kabulis, who drink it as 
often as they can afford it. 

Women smoke the chillum as well as men. It 
is shaped like the hookah, but has a straight stem 
instead of a flexible one. The tobacco is of country 
growth, and is very rank smelling, more resembling a 
burning oil rag than anything else. 

The Afghans call any large, fat man a strong one, 
and as fatness is considered a sign of both health and 
prosperity, all people who can afford to do so, eat 
until gorged, and in consequence many of them, both 
men and women, are grossly fat. The late Amir's 
chief physician was so fat he could not walk, and 
had to be carried. Another man was so fat that he 
could do nothing for himself, and had to be washed 
and dressed by his slave girls, much as a baby is. Of 
this man I was told that he once noticed a very 
objectionable smell about his body, and in spite of 
all that was done to better it, the smell at last got so 
bad that he told the slave girls to carry him to the 
hamam and bath him, and while washing him, as 
ordered, the girls discovered the cause of the nuisance 
to be a dead frog hidden in one of the folds of fat. 



Under the Absolute Amir 

It had no doubt got in when the man was having 
his last tub, and been crushed to death. 

Snuff-taking is also commonly indulged in by 
the better-class people. The poorer people, however, 
use the native tobacco, roughly crushed, and put it 
in their mouths, and there are some who can afford 
the snuff brought up from India who do the same 
in preference to sniffing it up the nose. 

It is only in the large houses that there are fire- 
places, but there are few people who are wealthy 
enough to afford the cost of the large quantity of 
wood required during the winter months in order 
to keep the rooms warm enough to sit in, for the 
doors and windows of all houses are so badly fitted 
that the draughts of wind make the rooms unbear- 
ably cold even with a large fire going, and one has 
to sit in furs to be comfortable. So, to reduce the 
cost of fuel to a minimum and yet keep themselves 
warm day and night, the people have the " sandalee." 
This is formed of a square wooden stool placed in 
the centre of the room and under the stool a small 
perforated iron box standing on legs, in which char- 
coal is burnt, and over all is spread a large rezai or 
quilt which covers the stool and fire-box, and 
extends on all sides over most of the floor of the 
room. The stool is used in order to keep the rezai 
away from the fire-box. Charcoal is lighted in 
the iron box, and when it is burning brightly the 
box is placed under the centre stool, whence the heat 
from the fire spreads under the whole of the rezai 

90 



Manners and Customs 

and keeps it very warm, and under such a cover 
the charcoal burns very slowly and the fire lasts 
for hours. Thin mattresses and pillows placed under 
the outer portion of the rezai are used to sleep on, 
or sit on in the daytime. Under this the whole of 
the family, father, mother, sons and their wives, 
daughters, children, aunts, and other relations, sleep 
at night, all being kept warm on the coldest night 
at the cost of a few pice for charcoal. The drawback 
is that at times with a newly lighted fire, the 
charcoal fumes are excessive, and produce nausea 
and headache, and sometimes suffocation, and also 
when a person is in the habit of using it during 
the day while having occasionally to go out into 
the frosty air, he often gets rheumatism, or other 
complaint. Another drawback is the moral effect 
on a whole family of men and women sleeping 
together in a small space under the rezai, and many 
call the sandalee " the devil's playground." In the 
guardrooms the soldiers use these sandalees too, the 
men sitting with their legs tucked under the rezai, 
while they have sheepskin coats covering the head 
and body, and in this way they can defy the bitterest 
wind. It is the one standing outside on guard who 
gets frozen to death at times. 

In Kabul and the principal cities time is kept 
by means of a sundial, but though there are tables 
printed in Persian of the daily difference between 
solar and mean time, the time given by them is only 
approximate, for the dials have been constructed 



Under the Absolute Amir 

for other latitudes, and they are fixed in the direction 
of the magnetic north instead of the true one. One 
day, after ascertaining the true time, I informed the 
Amir that the midday gun was twenty minutes fast ; 
but he said it was better so, for then they would 
not be late for midday prayers. Daily at midday 
a gun is fired to announce the time to the people, 
and those who have clocks and watches set them 
accordingly. Comparatively few, however, of the 
people are able to tell the time from a clock, 
and many have the most hazy idea of the length 
of time expressed by an hour or half an hour. 
This ignorance extends also to numbers, the people 
generally being able to count up to twenty, and 
any number above that is expressed as so many 
" taman " (score) together with the odd figure to 
make up the number. Some of the people do not 
even know the days of the week, and have to be 
told that a certain day is so many days after the 
present one. 

Courtship and marriage in Afghanistan differ in 
many respects from those interesting episodes in 
European countries, but in no respect more than 
in the man not seeing the girl until they are married, 
and she is his wife. Men in Afghanistan are not 
prone to talk about their wives, or the women of 
their family, and to ask after a man's wife is akin 
to an insult, as evincing some degree of familiarity 
with her. Under these circumstances a man's feel- 
ings while he is waiting to see what sort of girl he 

92 



Manners and Customs 

has married are not ascer tamable by direct question, 
but one would suppose that there must be an anxiety 
bordering on the intense to know what manner of 
woman it is that must hereafter be called " wife," for 
the women vary in face and form as much as the 
men, and the " pig in the poke " may be as beautiful 
as a houri, or as ugly as sin, if not uglier in the 
opinion of some sinners. 

Excepting in the case of boy and girl betrothals 
among people of high rank, which are arranged by 
the heads of the families, or when a young man's 
relations arrange which woman he shall marry, it is 
usual for a man when he desires another wife to 
make known his wishes to his friends and his inten- 
tion soon becomes public property. He then receives 
overtures from men with marriageable daughters, and 
the discussions with one and another are no light 
matter, for the prospective father-in-law expects 
money or kind in exchange for his daughter, and the 
beauty and qualities of the said daughter being an 
unknown quantity, the man is not inclined to be 
either liberal or rash. However, when the proceed- 
ings have at length assumed so much headway that 
the man is satisfied with the standing of the family 
the girl belongs to, and the family's future prospects, 
and considers that the father of the girl has reduced 
his demands to the lowest fraction, he then sends his 
female relatives to inspect the cause of the trouble, 
and on their verdict, other things being satisfactory, 
concludes the bargain. When all the bargaining is 

93 



Under the Absolute Amir 

over the ceremony of betrothal takes place, followed 
sooner or later by the marriage ceremony. 

The marriage ceremony depends for splendour 
and feasting upon the wealth and standing of the 
families of the contracting parties. With members of 
the royal family and people of high rank, it means a 
three days' tamasha, with the feasting of a great 
number of relatives and friends, and expenditure of 
further money in dancing-girls, bands, and other 
things. Although the expenditure varies according 
to the wealth of the persons concerned, in all cases 
the greatest splendour consistent with the rank of 
the contracting parties is aimed at, even if money 
must be borrowed to give a good show off, and in this 
they do not differ much from people nearer London. 
When the marriage ceremony is completed, the bride 
is carried in a sort of sedan chair to the bridegroom's 
house, and the bridegroom, together with many of his 
relations and friends riding on horseback, accompany 
her, carrying guns, which they fire as they go along, 
while in front of them goes a drum and fife band 
with men dancing and pirouetting in front of it. 
The shooting of guns is a relic of older times when a 
man with the aid of his friends had to obtain his 
bride by force of arms or some stratagem, and then 
carry her away in front of his saddle while her relatives 
pursued them. 

The weddings of the poor people have no display 
such as this, and the bride and bridegroom have per- 
force to walk before and after the ceremony, for they 

94 



Manners and Customs 

cannot afford a moullah, or priest, to come to the 
house, and so have to go to his place to be married. 
They may be seen in the street, the bridegroom 
walking first and the bride after him (no woman 
must walk in front of or even abreast a man); and 
after her is a girl friend or relative, carrying her 
clothes in a bundle on her head. In front of them 
walks a man with a tom-tom (native drum), and 
another with a tin whistle, both doing their best to 
enliven the proceedings by making the most noise 
possible with the instruments at their disposal, and so 
they wend their way to the bridegroom's poor house. 

I was told in Kabul that there is an old Afghan 
marriage custom among some of the tribes which 
differs from the above. With them, a man who 
wishes to marry a girl is allowed to live for some 
time in her father's house, using the girl as his wife, 
and when after a reasonable time has elapsed, there 
is evidence that the girl is going to become a mother, 
he marries her. Should this not happen, the man 
is at liberty to marry her, or depart, and elsewhere 
seek a wife who is capable of continuing his family. 
The wish for a son is very strong among the 
Afghans, and whereas the birth of a boy is accom- 
panied with great rejoicing, the birth of a girl passes 
unnoticed, the father showing his displeasure to the 
extent of, at times, refusing to see the mother until 
his anger has cooled with the passing of time. 

The treatment of the body of a dead person 
before burial is much the same as among Europeans, 

95 



Under the Absolute Amir 

except that the body is buried the day death occurs, 
and should a person die at night, the body is buried 
the next morning. When a man dies, the moullahs 
(priests) are sent for, and they wash the body (this 
is usually done at the side of the nearest stream), 
lay it out, and wrap it in the burial -sheet ready 
for interment. The burial-sheet is called " kafn," 
which is a word similar to our "coffin." No coffin 
is used. After preparing the body for burial, the 
moullahs say the prayers for the dead over it, in 
which they are joined by all the relatives and others 
present, the relations are sent for as soon as it is 
seen that a person is dying, and then the body is 
placed on a charpoy (wooden bedstead) and carried 
to the nearest musjid on the road to the graveyard, 
where the prayers for the dead are again said, after 
which the body is carried on to the burial-ground. 
Here the grave has been prepared beforehand, dug 
down some three feet, but recessed on one side at 
the bottom to receive the corpse, and as the earth 
must not fall on the body when filling the grave 
up, slabs of stone are placed against the recess. The 
body is laid on its side in the recess, with the face 
looking in the direction of Mecca, so that it may 
more easily see the beginning of the resurrection 
on the last day, and the grave is then filled up. 
According to Mussulmans, the resurrection on the 
last day begins at Mecca. A slab of stone about 
three feet by one foot, is placed at the head of the 
grave, but the stone is rough and uncut, and any 



Manners and Customs 

stone which is lying about is used, provided the 
shape is suitable. In the case of very important 
personages, a properly cut stone, setting forth the 
name of the person buried there, is placed at the 
head of the grave, and this used to be commonly 
done to mark the resting-places of other people, but 
the stones were taken by the late Amir for build- 
ings, as they were of a good quality, and nice white 
colour, and so the practice fell into disuse. 

After the burial, the relatives and friends gather 
in the house of the deceased person, and here they 
are entertained by the family, tea and food being 
provided for all who call to offer condolences, and 
to say the " fateah " or prayers for the dead, which 
it is customary to say on coming into the house. 
The expenses for these entertainments, and also 
those connected with marriages were so great, and 
brought so many into poverty, on account of all 
trying to do as well as, or better than their 
neighbours, whether they could afford it or not, 
that the present Amir made it a law that all such 
entertainments should cease, and instead of being 
in a way public affairs, should be made private, 
and guests include relatives only. 

It sometimes happens that a person dies so poor that 
there is not enough money even to buy the " kafn " 
(burial-sheet), which is only a shilling or so, and his 
relatives have to go through the bazars begging for one, 
or money to buy one. This happens now more often 
than it used to, for the people are yearly getting poorer. 

97 H 



CHAPTER YII 

AMIR ABDUR RAHMAN 

Form of Government Abuse of authority Amir's food and drinking 
water and taster Soldiers and horses always ready for flight 
Amir's habits Amir's amusements, attendants, etc. Amir's feelings 
towards England Amir's views on Afridi rising and Boer war 
Amir's stratagem. 

ABSOLUTE monarchy is the system of government in 
Afghanistan. Fortunately there are few parts of the 
earth where such a form of government exists, for it 
is not one which is likely to produce the greatest 
good for the greatest number. 

In Afghanistan no one but the Amir can order 
the death penalty ; no important question concerning 
the internal government of the country or its political 
relations with other countries can be dealt with or 
settled except by him ; all matters of import emanat- 
ing from the various State departments and offices 
must be referred to him for final judgment ; all 
officers and officials required for the Government 
service in different parts of the country must be 
selected and appointed by him, and all prisoners 
accused of any crime of a serious nature must be 
tried and sentenced by him. Besides these duties 
there are innumerable other matters which require 



Amir Abdur Rahman 

his attention, of which the mere reading of the pri- 
vate reports from spies occupies several hours each 
day. From this it will be seen that the man who 
can carry out all these duties and give each question 
the consideration due to it without neglecting some 
matter or another of importance to the interests of 
the country, is one who requires a quickness in 
grasping the essential points of a question, and a 
capacity for work which are unequalled. 

Amir Abdur Rahman was an exceptionally able 
man, and one who willingly gave the whole of 
his time and attention to the work required of him, 
working from the time he rose from his bed until he 
lay down again ; but even so he was unable to see to 
all things himself, and the absence of responsible 
officials duly authorized to investigate and settle 
those matters which were not of sufficient moment 
to be taken before him for judgment, wasted much 
of the time which ought to have been devoted to 
important questions on which the welfare of the 
country depended. However, it is not surprising 
that the Amir was chary of putting too much autho- 
rity in the hands of his officials, for those who had 
authority to judge minor cases invariably abused the 
authority given them, and the people who suffered 
through such abuse of authority, feared the enmity 
of the official too much to appeal to the Amir, and 
generally they were given cause to do so. As a case 
in point, I may mention that of a camel -owner who 
was brought before the city magistrate concerning 

99 



Under the Absolute Amir 

the non-payment of some Government duty. In this 
case the man was forced to pay the duty, besides 
having two of his camels confiscated, for the magis- 
trate did a transport business with camels himself. 
The camel-owner was naturally incensed at the injus- 
tice of the whole proceeding, and wrote the par- 
ticulars to the Amir, bribing an official to give in his 
application. Bribery must be resorted to in those 
cases where an official is the intermediary. All this 
was timely reported to the magistrate, who at once 
betook himself to durbar, and laid the case in his 
own way before the Amir, making out that the man 
was an old offender, and, to prevent him running 
away before his highness had judged his punishment, 
he had kept two of his camels as security. The 
letter the man had written was brought in just then 
and handed to the Amir ; but the Amir's mind was 
prejudiced, and he saw in the man's statement and 
an Afghan always overstates the case an endeavour 
to injure the character of the magistrate in revenge 
for the latter doing his duty. The man was there- 
fore put in prison, and the whole of his property was 
confiscated, so that he lost all he had instead of get- 
ting back the two camels first taken. 

With the Amir it is always the man who gets in 
his story or complaint first who wins, for the Afghan 
mind is readily prejudiced and chary of relinquishing 
first impressions, no matter how much truth lies in 
what is said by the man who speaks last. It is such 
cases as these, and more often than not an appeal to 

100 



Amir Abdur Rahman 

the higher power results in disaster to the applicant, 
which make the people chary of : disputing tEe Actions 
of the officials, and they therefore, bave to. put up 
with as much justice as -they can: get, 'either 'by 
intrigue or bribery, and keep quiet, while the officials 
grow fat and rich, and become arrogant with con- 
tinued prosperity, until one day they fly at game too 
high for them, and then come to grief and lose all, 
ending their days in prison or at the hands of the 
executioner. The late Amir one day told me that he 
trusted no one, and was so suspicious that he did not 
let his right hand know what the left one did ; and 
with such men round him it is not surprising that he 
should have felt so. 

Another thing which is further detrimental to 
the country lies in the officials being consulted on all 
matters concerning the interests of the people, for 
the Amir has no means of ascertaining the views and 
wishes of the people himself, and has to accept what 
his officials say, and this gives them the opportunity 
of bringing about that which is to their interest, and 
it is due to this selfish disregard of anything but their 
own profit that the officials force the people in yearly 
increasing numbers to give up the cultivation of 
their land and seek work elsewhere. 

The Amir and the Government of Afghanistan 
are said by the people to be separate and distinct, 
and there is a public and a private treasury, on both 
of which the Amir draws, himself defining those ex- 
penses which are private, and those the Government 

101 



Under the Absolute Amir 

must defray ; but here all distinction ends, and 
it is difficult to see w herein the difference lies. I 
have boon told that the Amir is the head of the 
Government; but -&o far as I could see he was head, 
body, and everything else, excepting where officials 
and governors of provinces save him the trouble of 
looking into matters which are profitable to them- 
selves. The Government stores chiefly contain the 
arms and ammunition made in the country or pur- 
chased elsewhere, while the private stores, in addition 
to those goods which are required for daily use, con- 
tain the valuable presents brought in from all parts 
of the country by the chiefs who visit the Amir, and 
those received from other Governments, and contain 
immense treasures. In the private stores also are 
all the latest novelties which have been sent for from 
India, and there are few articles in that way which 
are not to be found there. Very few, however, of 
the articles, except those of daily use, go into the 
stores and come out of it again, for most of the things 
are put away and forgotten, and neither the Amir 
nor his storekeepers know all that the stores contain, 
for there are no proper records kept except of articles 
of intrinsic value. 

The late Amir was very particular about his 
palaces, and the dwelling-places he built for himself 
were the first well- cons true ted buildings in the country, 
and they were furnished in the richest European style, 
all furniture and upholstery being of the best he could 
get in India or make in his own country. He insisted 

102 



Amir Abdur Rahman 

on all things about him being kept clean and tidy, 
and woe betide the unlucky slave boy who neglected 
his duty in that respect. 

His food was cooked in the Government kitchens, 
which are kept guarded so that no one but those who 
are authorized to do so can enter, and the chief cook, 
with several soldiers, had to accompany the dishes 
from the kitchen to the palace (all dishes are served 
at once, and not in courses), and when placed before 
the Amir it was the cook's duty to taste of each dish 
to show that the food was innocent of poison. Several 
high officials always dined with the Amir, the latter 
being seated at a small table covered with a white 
cloth, while on the ground stretching away in front 
of his table a long cloth was laid which was covered 
by another white one, and here, on both sides, 
squatted or kneeled the officials, all of them, the 
Amir included, eating with the right hand. The 
hands are washed both before and after a meal. 
The very best and richest foods, in the way of pilaus 
and kabobs, were cooked, and all were seasoned with 
spices, and the bread was the usual Afghan nan (flat 
cake), but the Amir preferred white bread baked in 
small loaves similar to the English ones. 

If an Englishman dined with the Amir he was 
given a separate table, and a Hindustani cook and his 
assistants prepared and served the food in the usual 
English way, while, for drink, he had the choice of 
various wines and spirits, which the Amir used to 
keep in the stores for such purpose, although he 



103 



Under the Absolute Amir 

himself always drank water, in accordance with the 
tenets of his religion. 

The Amir's drinking water, as well as all food for 
him, was very carefully guarded. One man was held 
responsible for it, and had charge of the key of 
the room in which it was kept locked. The same 
was done with the tea, for which another man was 
responsible, and another, a hakeem (doctor), was 
responsible for all medicine, mixing it and bringing 
it to the Amir himself. The positions these men held 
were no sinecure, for if the Amir had any strange 
pain in his body they had a very unpleasant time of 
it until the pain was gone, or proved to be due to 
natural causes, and at such times these men went 
about with a strained look on their faces, for none 
knew what fancy might seize the Amir to their 
undoing. 

The present Amir follows the same procedure as 
his father, but, owing to one or two plots against 
him, which fortunately came to nothing, all measures 
for safety are more strictly enforced, and all the men 
responsible for what the Amir eats and drinks wear 
a more harassed look. 

One of the late Amir's precautions was to be 
always ready at a moment's notice either for fighting 
or travelling to any part of his kingdom, or out of it 
if needs be. For this purpose several horses (which 
were changed every few hours) were kept day and 
night in the stalls by the door of the palace ready 
saddled and bridled, requiring only the girths to be 

104 



t I 

V. 



Amir Abdur Rahman 

tightened for mounting. Several fast mules were 
also kept ready in other stalls for carrying treasure, 
etc., on the journey. A cupboard with glass doors was 
kept by the head of the Amir's bed in which was 
stacked his best rifles, and with them boxes of 
ammunition, while under his pillow were two or 
three revolvers ready loaded, so that the Amir was 
ever ready for emergencies. In addition a picked 
company of sowars, called the " Hazarbash " guard 
(ever present), were always ready night and day out- 
side the palace to accompany the Amir. This guard 
the Amir kept provisioned for a few days, so that 
they might start at any moment on a journey, and 
those on duty were relieved at intervals. The Amir's 
life had been an adventurous one, and it had taught 
him, and his experience in ruling his people had con- 
firmed it, that it is wise to be ready at all times for 
anything that happens. 

It was the Amir's custom to sit up working most 
of the night, and not to retire to rest until about four 
o'clock in the morning. He would then rise between 
twelve and two o'clock in the day, and, after dressing 
and taking food, would hold durbar. This habit of 
keeping awake most of the night was probably due 
to fear of a rising or treachery, which would be 
attempted at night rather than during the day, when 
all the people were about. Occasionally he held 
a public durbar in the salaam khana, a specially 
large audience chamber built in the garden outside 
Arak, and on these occasions any persons desirous of 

105 



Under the Absolute Amir 

petitioning him wore allowed to eome before him, and 
anything they had to say was listened to. The people 
who wanted to make personal application to the Amir 
ushered in by the shagrasi, an official whose duty 
it was to present people to the Amir ; but they had 
first to square the captain of the guard on the gate, 
and also certain other persons through whose hands 
passed, before being allowed in. The Amir was 
a very hard worker, and opened and answered all 
letters as they came, and continued doing so, no 
matter what other business was in hand, until he 
slept. As soon as he was dressed each day people 
were brought before him either to state their grievances 
or for trial, and deputations from tribes in various 
parts of the country were received and listened to. 
He put off no work until a later date that was 
possible of completion, but tried to get each day's 
work finished the same day. 

The Amir seldom spent much time in the 
harem serai amongst his women, it being his custom 
to devote an occasional evening to them only, and 
his opinion of women in general was not a high one. 
On some occasions he spoke rather plainly of the 
length, and lying propensities, of a woman's tongue, 
and her general inaptitude for anything of worth, 
and love of intrigue. Solomon'eventually found little 
worth having in woman's society, and no doubt 
familiarity breeds contempt in more cases than his. 

The Amir's amusements were few and simple- 
He would stop for a few weeks in turn, at each of his 

1 06 



Amir Abdur Rahman 

summer palaces in the spring and early summer, to 
ir of the country and the scent of the 
flowers, of which he was passionately fond, and would 
eventually reach Baghibala, which is some four miles 
out of the city on the road to Paghman, and was his 
favourite summer palace, and would stop there until 
winter drove him back to the warmer city palaces. 
The Amir always had flowers in the room where he 
was, and in winter and spring when there were no 
flowers in Kabul, he had them sent from Jelalabad 
and other places which are at a lower altitude than 
Kabul and have a warmer climate. One day when I 
was with the Amir, he spoke of some flowers beside 
him, and taking one of them smelt it, and found it 
had no scent. The gardener was ordered to be sent 
for, and he came in with pale face and knees knocking 
against each other, for having no knowledge of the 
reason why he was wanted, he no doubt feared the 
, and probably he was the same as others in 
having done more than he would care for the Amir 
to know. When the Amir looked up from his reading 
and saw the gardener, he asked why the flowers had 
no smell, and the gardener, at a loss to reply, could 
only lick his dry lips as he sought an excuse. The 
Amir, however, told him of a certain manure he was 
always to use, and bade him beware if the flowers 
had no scent the following year, and then told him 
to return to his work. 

Occasionally the Amir would drive or be carried 
out to the chaman (marshy plain) where duck 

107 



Under the Absolute Amir 

shooting was obtainable, but during the last few years 
of his reign he was seldom equal to the exertion of 
doing so, for he suffered almost constantly from gout 
and its accompanying ailments. His indoor amuse- 
ments were chess, of which he was so able an expo- 
nent that few in his court could compete with him, 
and his only other amusement was in listening to or 
telling stories, and joking with one and another of 
the officials, during the occasional free-and-easy hour 
following dinner, when the Amir became as one of 
those surrounding him, and gave himself up to jest 
and repartee, before again assuming the duties and 
dignity of the head of the State. One of the 
recognized members of his suite was the court jester, 
who was dressed, however, as others were, and not in 
cap and bells, whose duty it was to joke and make 
merry when the Amir was so inclined. The jokes 
and stories, and the gestures used to illustrate 
the stories were, however, always too broad for those 
who are delicately inclined. This may be the out- 
come of the want of women's refining influence, for 
women, of course, are never present in such gather- 
ings, and men mingle with men, and see no women 
except those of their own house. Jesters were also 
among the retinues of the princes ; but, without the 
restraining influence of the Amir to keep them a little 
in check, the jokes of these men were not even fit for 
a barrack-room. 

The attendants with the Amir, or ghulam bachaha 
(slave boys), as they are called, are mostly the sons 

1 08 



Amir Abdur Rahman 

of chiefs. These boys are given to the Amir for his 
use, and are trained in his service, and when they 
grow up, are given civil or military appointments. 
These attendants, besides waiting on the Amir, had 
charge of various duties, some being placed in charge 
of the lamps and candles, others the carpets, others 
books and papers, others arms, etc. ; and each was 
held responsible for the proper conduct and safe 
keeping of that in his charge. Neglect of duty or 
other offence was punished at once, and often 
severely. In one case, some boys were stripped of 
their clothes and tied to trees in the garden, and 
kept there the greater part of a winter night. 
Another, a storekeeper, had his nose cut off for 
stealing some of the articles in his charge. All had 
to be cleanly dressed, and while in the Amir's 
presence, had to keep silence, and walk or move 
about without noise. Their clothes were gaudy, 
being mostly of coloured velvets, with plenty of gold 
lace and fur trimmings, and their turbans or hats 
were of the richest description. The present Amir, 
who is fond of plain dress and quiet colours, has his 
attendants dressed in black clothes cut in the fashion 
of frock-suits, the frock-coats being rather long and 
more in the Turkish official style, while among the 
officials generally a similar style of dress is worn, 
except when a man has a position which entitles him 
to a uniform, which pleases him best the more gold 
lace it has. There were many officials, as well as 
slave boys, who dressed in velvets in the court of 

109 



Under the Absolute Amir 

Amir Abdur .Rahman, and on a durbar day they 
presented a gay appearance, so far as dress was 
concerned. 

After '97 the Amir's feelings towards England 
and the English changed, and those of his court had 
to see that they conducted themselves as comported 
with his mood. Sirdar Mahomed Omar told his half- 
brother, Sirdar Aminoolah, one day at that time, not 
to go before his father in the English gaiters he was 
wearing, and to be careful not to wear anything 
English on such occasions. The Amir was greatly 
disappointed in the failure of Sirdar Nasrullah 
Khan's mission to England in '9.5, which was chiefly 
to obtain consent to an Afghan envoy being 
appointed in London. As this meant dealing over 
the head of the Indian Government, it was negatived 
by the English authorities. Also the letters he 
received from the Indian Government, concerning his 
participation in the Afridi rising on the borders, in 
August, '97, were bitter to him. One, which plainly 
hinted at the loss of his throne, if such happenings 
occurred again, he read out in public durbar held for 
the occasion, and to which all leading men were 
summoned, and after reading it, he accused his 
people of doing that which brought upon him dis- 
grace at the hands of his ally. About this time he 
sent for me, and spoke for several hours on the 
Afridi rising, and the trouble the border tribes had 
caused him, and seemed particularly bitter against the 
Haddah moullah, Maulavi Najmudeen Aghondzada, 

no 



Amir Abdur Rahman 

who was the principal instigator of the rising. 
He said that since he came to the throne, re- 
bellions had been frequent, and though each revolt 
had been put down with a strong hand (those who 
know the Amir's methods will understand what his 
" strong hand " meant), it had not been sufficient to 
prevent further risings, for his people were not only 
the most unruly, but the most fanatical of all people. 
As to his having participated in forwarding the rising, 
the Amir argued that the people once risen and 
flushed with any little success, would become beyond 
the control of any man, and there were old scores to 
be wiped off between the border tribes and the 
Afghans, so that any rising was a menace to himself. 
And in addition to this, a rising in one part of the 
country would undoubtedly lead to similar risings 
and revolt in other parts, and it was only by his firm 
ruling and the stringent methods adopted towards 
those who sought to agitate the people, that the 
country was kept quiet. 

The Amir said that no one knew to what country 
the Haddah moullah belonged, for he had no known 
relations, and during Shere Ali's reign the moullah 
had been allowed to do much as he liked with the 
people, and raise revolt at his pleasure. He himself, 
however, had made inquiries, and found out the 
moullah's mode of procedure, and had arranged to 
capture him, but the moullah received timely in- 
formation of his intention, and escaped across the 
frontier, where he shortly afterwards raised the 

in 



Under the Absolute Amir 

Shinwari and other tribes against him, and for some 
months gave considerable trouble, and it was not 
until four thousand or so had been killed that the 
tribes were quieted. And this was the man whose 
actions he was held responsible for. 

The Haddah moullah had great influence with 
the tribes, the Amir said, and had sent agents to 
the Jelalabad and Laghman districts, where they 
induced some three thousand men to join them, but 
the governor of Jelalabad got news of it and stopped 
them, and on asking by whose permission they were 
going on this jihad (religious war), they replied that 
they were told by the agents of the moullah the 
Amir had given permission. The Amir said that 
of their leaders he had four sheikhs and two maliks, 
who carried the green jihad flag, in prison in Kabul, 
and he knew what to do with them, but the other 
leaders had escaped. 

It was on this occasion that two men were 
brought in before the Amir as refugees from India, 
who had returned according to the amnesty issued 
by the Amir a few years before to all who had 
been driven out of the country ; but the Amir said 
that the men were lying, and he had ample proof 
that they were spies from Ayoob Khan, who wanted 
reports of all said and done in his durbar. He said 
that both Ayoob Khan and Yakoob Khan yearly 
spent large sums of money in trying to get informa- 
tion of what he was doing, and to show how little 
he feared their influence, the Amir said : "If they 

112 



Amir Abdur Rahman 

will pay their money to me I will send them weekly 
or monthly reports, and give them all news of what 
happens, and my reports will be true ones, for no 
one else knows what I do or intend doing, and not 
even my most trusted officials know of any secret 
matters of importance." 

The Amir's great wish, as he often expressed it 
when I have been in durbar, was to make his 
country rich by developing all its resources and 
bringing it on a level with other countries, and 
had he been gifted with health no doubt much 
would have been done towards it ; but he was con- 
fined to his room mostly, and had to depend on 
his officials for information, and they proved a poor 
staff to lean on. 

In another letter the Amir received about this 
time from the Indian Government, he told me that 
it was written that he had been faithful for twenty 
years, and yet in the same letter it was also written 
that he was buying too much war material, and 
that the Parliament in England would perhaps get 
suspicious. He could not reconcile these two state- 
ments, and said he came to the country as ruler 
without arms, and was recognized and acknowledged 
as Amir by the English, and his first act as ruler 
was to help them in providing for General Roberts' 
army on its march from Kabul to Kandahar by 
giving orders all along the route to the maliks, and 
others in authority, to bring in provisions for the 
English army at each camping place, and in no way 

113 i 



Under the Absolute Amir 

to molest them, whereby the English were enabled 
to march rapidly and without trouble to Kandahar. 
According to his treaty with the English it was 
necessary for them to furnish him with the latest 
arms to enable him to stand as her ally between 
her and Eussia ; but, instead of having them given 
to him, he had bought war material himself, and 
was now told not to do so. When the Eussians 
extended their railway to Khuskh, they asked him 
to take advantage of it by trading that way, and 
he sent a copy of the letter to the Indian Govern- 
ment, asking what answer he should give, and they 
replied, " Give no answer ; " but he was forced to 
reply or it might end in trouble or war, so he 
replied to the Russians that they had constructed 
this railway without consulting him, and had they 
done so in time he would have asked his merchants 
and people their opinion and what they wished, but 
they had made the railway for their own con- 
venience, and his country did not want it, as their 
camels and pack-horses were sufficient for their own 
needs. He said he sent a copy of his reply to the 
Indian Government, who wrote back to say he had 
done :Well. He said he did not blame the English 
officials for what they wrote, because they were 
under the orders of the Parliament, but his idea of 
the Parliament was that it was like the Kabul public 
hamam (Turkish bath), where many are speaking at 
once, and the reverberations of sound from the big 
dome overhead mingles one man's talk with that of 

114 



Amir Abdur Rahman 

others, so that all sequence of speech is lost in the 
confusion of sounds. 

The great Boer War had just commenced at that 
time, and the Amir said he had spent several nights 
in anxious thought, for it seemed possible that the 
Russians might take advantage of this to advance 
through his country on India, but when he put 
himself in the place of the Russians and viewed the 
situation from their side, and he had spent many 
years in exile in Russia, and knew them and their 
ways and policy, he found much to fear from 
Afghanistan, for a war with them meant a general 
rising of Islam, which would spread to Russian Asia, 
and they had not enough troops for all that this 
meant, for the Mussulman countries she had con- 
quered were insecurely held, and the people hated 
their conquerors, and as the Afghans would prefer 
death to being enslaved, and their women and children 
taken, it would be too great an undertaking to 
quell these risings, and fight Afghanistan and India 
at the same time. 

About the Boer War he said he was very much 
grieved to hear of the number of troops lost. He 
had had a large experience in fighting, and from the 
different pictures and plans he had seen, he thought 
the fighting arrangements were not good, for the 
Boers were entrenched and hidden, and the English 
advanced on them in the open, and as the bodies 
of men are not made of steel, it is impossible to 
stand against the hail of bullets which modern 



Under the Absolute Amir 

weapons storm out every minute. He said he could 
send fifty thousand troops to help the British, but 
Afghans are unused to ships, and would be demoralized 
if sent in them, but England must always remember 
that he was ready to fight for her on his side or 
in India. He once told me an anecdote of the time 
when he was in Russia, and the Russo-Turkish War 
was raging. He was asked to join the Russian army 
with his followers in this war, for they told him they 
had heard that he was a great general, and would 
like to test his powers. But he was in no mood 
to fight for the Russians, particularly as they were 
fighting against his co-religionists, so he replied that 
to fight on their side would give them no opportunity 
of testing his merits and bravery, for all the Russians 
were brave and good fighters, and he would be one 
among many. Therefore it was better they should 
let him fight on the enemy's side, and then when 
lie was fighting against them, his ability, or want 
of it, would be made apparent, and they could 
judge for themselves. They asked him no more, 
he said. 

In speaking of the foregoing matters the Amir 
said these and other anxieties were hard for one 
man to bear. He had to be strong enough to 
fight Russia both for the sake of his country, and 
because of his treaty with the English, and yet he 
was told he was buying too much war material. 
He tried to keep on the best of terms with his 
alley, and was told he stirred up the tribes to fight 

116 



Amir Abdur Rahman 

against them. Then, again, he had many reforms 
at heart for the benefit of his country, and his own 
officials were unreliable, and he could not ascertain 
the true wishes and views of the people, so that he 
might alter those laws which pressed upon them, 
and help them to better themselves, and yet he 
must strive that his people live in peace, security, 
and prosperity. 

Although Amir Abdur Eahman was an exception- 
ally able man, he had received little or no education 
and training, except in the hard school of adversity, 
and the history of his adventures and adversities 
until he was made Amir would form a stirring 
romance. He was undoubtedly the strongest ruler 
Afghanistan has known, for when he came to the 
throne lawlessness reigned and had reigned for all 
time throughout the country, and no man's life was 
safe who could not protect himself, and when he died 
a solitary traveller might journey from one end of 
the country to the other in safety. He was also a 
man of great personal courage, as those who fought 
against him knew, and he was relentless in vengeance 
for any wrong done him. 

He told me an anecdote one day of when he was 
at war with other members of his family and had 
lost all but a remnant of his followers. He had 
taken refuge in a village fort, and one of his followers 
had treacherously betrayed his whereabouts to his 
enemy, who came that night with a large number of 
soldiers, and surrounding the fort, clamoured at the 

117 



Under the Absolute Amir 

gate for his surrender. He was without provisions 
for his men and horses, and^was greatly outnumbered, 
so that fighting was useless, and he determined on 
stratagem as a means of getting out of the difficulty, 
for his capture, he knew, meant death. So putting 
on a large posteen (sheepskin coat) which covers the 
body down to the feet, and is usually worn at night, 
covering the head as well as the body, he had himself 
let out of a small door at the side of the fort, and 
with a pistol in his hand which he kept hidden under 
the sheepskin he mingled with the soldiers outside, 
who did not molest him thinking he was one of 
themselves. Eventually he came to where his enemy 
was standing, and watching his opportunity when 
none of the others were near he seized him from 
behind, and clapping the pistol to the back of his 
head, ordered him to make no outcry or instant death 
would follow, and then by roundabout ways he 
led his prisoner to the small door he came out from, 
and got him into the fort. Here, as a condition of 
life, he made him give orders from the wall for his 
followers to retire to a considerable distance, and 
thereafter he effected his escape and got clear away 
with his men. 

The Amir was a good judge of character, and was 
fond of reading the characters of men he had never 
seen from their photos, and in those cases where I 
knew the men, whose photo he was studying, his 
reading of their character was mostly correct. He 
had a great admiration for Gladstone, Bismarck, and 

118 



Amir Abdur Rahman 

McMahon, and said they were the leading men of 
their time. There were few generals he admired, 
subjecting most to a good deal of adverse criticism, 
but General White's defence of Ladysmith, he said, 
was the most brilliant achievement of the Boer War. 



119 



CHAPTER VIII 

AMIR ABDUR RAHMAN Continued 

Amir's sons and his treatment of them Princes and their duties and 
durbars Food supplied by Government to members of royal family 
How officials are paid Civil and military titles Court life and 
officials Law courts Amir's lingering illness, death and burial 
Rumours of rising Fears of populace Burial of household treasures 
Plots to get body Coronation of Amir Habibullah New Amir's 
promises of reform Amusements. 

THERE are five sons of the Amir living ; Habibullali 
(the present Amir), and Nasrullah (who was sent 
to London), both sons of one wife ; Aminoolah, the 
son of a Chitrali wife ; Mahomed AH, the son of a 
Turkestani wife, who has lived mostly in Turkistan, 
and is seldom heard of; and Mahomed Omar, the 
son of the Queen-Sultana. The Amir, although 
always treating his sons in a kindly manner, was 
never familiar with them, and his attitude towards 
them was that of king to subject, rather than father 
to son. If they committed a blunder or offended in 
the discharge of their duties, he punished by ordering 
them not to show themselves in durbar, and so kept 
them under the ban of his displeasure for a longer 
or shorter time, which he ended by sending them 
an order to come to him, and then the one in 

I2O 



Amir Abdur Rahman 

disgrace would come and kneel before his father, 
and be allowed to kiss his hand in recognition of 
forgiveness. 

The Amir gave his sons high official positions 
with proportionate salaries, but in no way allowed 
them to become influential, or to exercise unlimited 
power. Many of the chief officials had greater 
authority than the Amir's sons, and treated the 
princes with scant courtesy, particularly towards 
the end of the Amir's reign. Sirdar Habibullah 
was the nominal head of the army, and chief officer 
of all workshops ; Sirdar Nasrullah was head of all 
the offices and mirzas (writers or clerks), and the 
others held minor appointments. 

The princes held their own durbars, which many 
officials and officers attended, either in connection 
with their duties or to " salaam " the princes. They 
all had separate houses situated in the new part 
of the city, and the two elder ones had country 
houses also, in which they used to spend part of 
the summer. Sirdar Nasrullah, after his return 
from London, had his salary increased, and shortly 
afterwards built a new house for himself on the 
lines of the house he had stopped in during his 
stay in London (Dorchester House in Park Lane). 
In arrangement and upholstery, the house was the 
best in Kabul, and on its completion, the Amir 
stopped there for a few days as the prince's guest, 
and was delighted with it all, for the Amir greatly 
admired good architecture, and his own buildings 

121 



Under the Absolute Amir 

were the only innovations on the old mud and brick 
dwellings common to the country, which had sufficed 
for former rulers. 

All the members of the royal family, that is, the 
whole of the Mahomedzai family, received an allow- 
ance from the Government. Four hundred rupees a 
year (about 12 10s.) was allowed to each boy, and 
three hundred to each girl, and food from the royal 
kitchen was also supplied to the greater number of 
them ; but this was stopped under the regime of the 
present Amir, and a further allowance in money 
granted instead. The greater scarcity of food, and 
its consequent dearness, was the chief reason for 
doing so. 

The officials of the Government and others 
attached to the Amir received salaries of from two 
hundred to six thousand a year, and although many 
have incomes derived from their own lands, they all 
live beyond their apparent income, the surplus being 
obtained in ways best known to themselves ; usually, 
the greater the rascal the greater the income. 
Formerly the salaries of the officials were paid by 
barats (orders) on the revenue due from different 
lands in the country, and the officials had to collect 
this themselves, whereby the expenses of revenue 
officers were spared the Government. But eventually 
one of the highest officials used to buy up all these 
barats, charging so much per , cent, discount, and 
collect the whole, a proceeding profitable to himself, 
but detrimental to the interests of the country, as his 

122 



Amir Abdur Rahman 

agents left the ryots (cultivators) nothing to live on, 
more often than not, and caused many of them to 
leave their bit of land and seek employment else- 
where. This wholesale robbery by the collectors of 
revenue is one of the chief causes of the present low 
state of the exchequer. 

Officials are given titles according to the work or 
department they have charge of, but in addition 
many receive the title of colonel or brigadier, or 
other military title, without being attached to a 
regiment, and these are called Civil officers. All 
officers of the army and officials are given a feast 
once a year, on the occasion of the jeshan, or 
celebration of the anniversary of the Amir's title of 
" Light of religion and faith," and on this occasion 
all men are received in durbar, and are afterwards 
given a dinner, and as the palace will not hold all, 
the bulk of them sit in the adjacent gardens, and 
their dinner is served to them there. 

The officials in their treatment of the English 
residents in Kabul, reflect the mind of the Amir and 
his attitude towards the English Government, and 
when the Amir happens to be prejudiced against the 
Indian Government, on account of their attitude 
towards him being firmer than is consistent with the 
consideration he considers due to himself, the English 
in Kabul are included in his displeasure, and all 
officials follow the lead of their master by being scant 
of courtesy, to the verge of rudeness. At other 
times, when the English are in favour, the officials 

123 



Under the Absolute Amir 

are profuse in their offers of service. Among them- 
selves, when one official is in high favour with the 
Amir, and they all take their turn at that, for no one 
of them is in favour long, the favoured one is fawned 
on and flattered by all the rest of them, but in their 
hearts they hate him, and plot his downfall at the 
time they flatter him. 

The Law Courts of the country, if they can be 
called so, are divided into two sorts. Offences against 
or cases pertaining to their religion are first tried in 
the court of the Khan-i-Moullah (chief moullah), and 
if beyond his powers, are referred to the chief Sirdar, 
and afterwards to the Amir. Offences against the 
law are tried in the court of the Kotwal (city 
magistrate), and those cases beyond his powers are 
also referred to the chief Sirdar, and again by him, if 
beyond his jurisdiction, to the Amir. For social 
offences persons are tried by their peers ; the 
commoner by commoners, and the khan (chief) by 
khans. To the above courts the present Amir has 
added a special jury to try those cases which would 
otherwise be referred to him, and this jury, although 
given special powers to act, must send their findings 
to the Amir for confirmation. The present Amir has 
also formed a parliament consisting of about thirty 
heads of departments, who discuss the laws requiring 
reform, and when, after the discussion, a majority is 
in favour of any alteration, the proposed new law is 
written down for the sanction of the Amir, who after- 
wards confirms it or otherwise, but mostly otherwise 

124 



Amir Abdur Rahman 

in those cases I heard of. To the parliament is 
also delegated the trial of those cases which involve 
the sifting of much evidence, and take time, the 
finding of the parliament, as in other cases, having 
to be confirmed by the Amir. Another jury has 
also been appointed to try those cases of prisoners 
who have been imprisoned without trial, of which 
there are many in Kabul, where prisoners of all 
sorts generally average between twenty and thirty 
thousand, with orders to report fully to the Amir 
on each case. 

For the last ten years of his life the gout that the 
Amir suffered from gradually took greater hold of 
him, and he could walk but very little, and had to be 
carried whenever he went any distance, while for the 
last two or three years he was unable to stand, and 
had to be carried about, even in the room. He got 
gradually weaker also, through the repeated attacks 
of illness, which came on at shorter and shorter 
intervals, and gradually, too, his brain became 
affected, until it was only at times that he was able 
to "think or reason clearly. In this condition he had 
to rely still more on his officials, and eventually the 
power of the government practically lay in the hands 
of three of them, who in the Amir's weakened con- 
dition had gained his confidence, and were able to 
turn his niind in any direction they pleased. These 
men. as the habit of the country is, usurped the 
power they had while it was theirs, until their con- 
duct became so arrogant that they made themselves 

125 



Under the Absolute Amir 

very unpopular. One of them even went so far as to 
take away by force the carpenters and carts at work 
on Sirdar Habibullah's new house, giving the Amir's 
name as the excuse, and knowing the Amir was not 
in the condition to properly listen to his son's com- 
plaint, even if the son had the audacity to place the 
matter before his father. This man was degraded 
from his office soon after Sirdar Habibullah became 
Amir. 

Eventually, in the spring of 1901, Amir Abdur 
Eahman suddenly had a stroke, and it was thought 
that it was all over with him ; but he rallied, and 
lingered on until some six months later, when, on 
October 1, he died, and it was said that his feet 
were dead a few days before, and the stench from 
them was such that no one could stop long in the 
same room with him. On the day when the Amir 
lay dying, and it was seen that there was no hope of 
recovery, Sirdar Habibullah and Sirdar Nasrullah, 
together with several of the leading officials, held a 
consultation, and decided upon the steps to be taken 
immediately the Amir's life had passed, for trouble 
and revolt were confidently expected as soon as it 
became known for a fact by the people that the 
Amir was dead, and also it was expected that the 
Queen- Sultana would try to get the army to side 
with her in getting her son Mahomed Omar crowned 
Amir; she had a good deal of influence, and was 
popular with most people. It was decided at this 
council that Sirdar Habibullah was to succeed his 

126 



Amir Abdur Rahman 

father, and that when the Amir was dead he should 
at once occupy the fortified palace of Arak, in which 
is the treasury, together with the stores of modern 
arms, for the possession of that would make him 
practically master of the situation, and when there, 
even should the soldiers rise, as was feared, there was 
the possibility of holding out until matters quieted 
down, and terms could be arranged. 

At the time of the Amir's death, which occurred 
at night, all the princes and the leading officials were 
present in an ante-room of the Baghibala palace, 
where the Amir lay, having been present from the 
afternoon, when they were summoned from their 
council with the announcement that the Amir could 
not last much longer. When those who were watch- 
ing came in and announced that the Amir was dead, 
one of the chief officials present took the late Amir's 
hat, and putting it on Sirdar Habibullah's head, 
declared him Amir, upon which all present, taking his 
hand in turn, gave the vows of allegiance, and called 
him Amir, and another of them, going into an adjoin- 
ing room, where Sirdar Mahomed Omar sat, brought 
him in, and told him to acknowledge the new Amir, 
which he did, giving the vows as the others had. 
That official earned the Queen- Sultana's undying 
hatred for doing this. 

The new Amir then went to the city, with most of 
the officials and his own followers, and occupied Arak, 
having already arranged matters with the brigadier 
in charge of the picked troops there, and who was 

127 



Under the Absolute Amir 

soon after raised to the rank of colonel. Sirdar 
Na^rullah Khan was left at Baghibala that night to 
superintend the removal to Arak of all furniture, 
carpets, ornaments, etc. This he did the same night 
by carts, and in the morning he brought in the 
Amir's body to Arak also, but while doing so was 
escorted by a strong force of cavalry, in case the 
news of the Amir's death should have leaked out, 
and a rising be precipitated by the sight of the body 
being carried in. 

That day, too, the furniture of the Queen-Sultana 
was sent from the harem serai inside Arak to her 
palace, Gulistan Serai, just outside the walls, and 
the new Amir's wives were installed in Arak. It 
was then publicly announced that the Amir was 
dead, and all offices, works, and shops were closed, 
and it was also announced that the funeral would 
take place that day. In view of possible emergencies 
the guard of seven men with each European was 
doubled the day the Amir lay dying by another 
guard from the Ardeel regiment, from whom are 
drawn the outer guards for the royal palaces and 
harems, and who are looked upon as reliable men. 

It was confidently expected by the people of all 
classes in Kabul that the death of the Amir would 
be the signal for a general insurrection, in which 
the army would lead, and, no doubt, it was not 
mere conjecture which led all people to expect it. 
To safeguard themselves as far as possible against 
the consequences of such riot and revolt, the people 

128 




AMIR ABDUR RAHMAN KHAN. 



[To face p. 128. 



Amir Abdur Rahman 

buried their jewels and treasures in the floors of 
their houses, and got in as large a supply of flour, 
food, and fuel, as they could afford. They also 
brought out all the arms they possessed for each 
man intending holding his own house as a fort 
during the riots. "Wild-looking, scantily dressed 
men came down in numbers from the mountains, 
carrying battle-axes and old flintlocks, and overran 
Kabul and the roads round about, for the news of 
the Amir's death had acted on them like the sight 
of a dead carcase on vultures, and caused them to 
flock round from great distances in an incredibly 
short space of time to see what loot was going. 
These are the people who are feared by the inhabi- 
tants of Kabul when disturbances set in, for they 
come in thousands, naked, practically, and having 
nothing to lose but life, which they value little, 
loot all, rich and poor alike, for the poor of Kabul 
are like princes for wealth to them. They even 
demolish houses for the sake of the wood used in 
their construction, and the house in which I lived 
had once been rased to the ground by them, and 
been rebuilt by the Government. 

I was told that there was a plot on foot to get 
the Amir's body on the way to the tomb, which 
he had built outside Kabul at Kila Asham Khan 
some years before, and cut it into pieces that dogs 
might eat it. (This is looked upon as the greatest 
evil that can befall the body of a Mussulman.) The 
road from Kabul leading to Kila Asham Khan, and 

129 K 



Under the Absolute Amir 

the hills along the route, were black with people 
about two o'clock that day, waiting for the funeral 
procession to pass, and there was a general air of 
suppressed excitement among all the people as the 
time fixed for the funeral drew near, which showed 
itself in a quickness of movement and alert look, 
foreign to their usual leisurely style, and betrayed 
the nervous excitement under which all laboured. 
However, news of all this having reached the 
authorities, the late Amir's body was buried instead 
in the east wing of the Boistan Serai Palace, which 
is just outside Arak and alongside the Queen- 
Sultana's palace, and the day passed without any- 
thing untoward happening. 

There were six Europeans in Kabul at the time 
of the Amir's death Mrs. Daly, the lady doctor, 
Mr. Fleischer, a German (murdered there in 1904), 
with his wife, child, and nurse, and myself and 
the question was discussed as to what should be 
done in case of a rising, and although we talked 
the matter over thoroughly, we could see no 
means of escape from the city or the country, 
and there seemed nothing to be done to safeguard 
ourselves but to decide on getting all together in 
one house as soon as rioting started, provided we 
had sufficient time to do so, and barricade and 
defend that as long as possible, for the European 
residents would be among the first to be attacked, 
and the guards could not be depended on to fight 
for the infidel against their own people when once 

130 



Amir Abdur Rahman 

order was overthrown. We knew that, so long as 
the soldiers remained faithful to the Amir, there 
would be no rising which could not be easily quelled, 
but if the soldiers rose against the Amir, then the 
guards, with the Europeans, would no doubt shoot 
down the kafirs to begin with, and, in fact, one of 
the guards threatened a servant of Mrs. Daly's that 
as soon as fighting commenced, they would kill the 
servants of the Europeans first, and the Europeans 
afterwards. I had obtained a quantity of Martini- 
Henri cartridges from the workshops for the use 
of the guard with me in case they were attacked 
by the people, and at the time of the funeral they 
were very anxious I should serve these out to them 
at once ; but I preferred waiting to see the course 
events would take before giving them the means 
to make themselves dangerous to me, and others 
with me, in the event of the army revolting, and 
told them to keep their minds at rest, for the 
cartridges would be served out in time enough for 
use when wanted. Undoubtedly the soldiers were 
ready to revolt, and intended doing so, if any one 
could be got to lead them, and each regiment ex- 
pected the others to commence the rising, and were 
ready to join them when they did so, but there 
was no combination among them, and no man had 
sufficient courage to take the lead. The officers of 
the guards, who came round to my house on the 
day of the funeral to see that all precautions for 
safety were taken, and posted some of the guards 



Under the Absolute Amir 

on the roof whence they could command the neigh- 
bouring houses, told me to be ready for any emer- 
gency, as from all they heard it was likely enough 
that I, with many of themselves, would be killed 
before the night. Also, to prevent any disturbance 
being precipitated by an attack on the Europeans, 
the other Europeans and myself were told to keep 
in the house, and not go into the bazars on any 
account. 

On the day following the burial of the Amir, 
October 3, 1901, Sirdar Habibullah, the eldest son of 
Amir Abdur Rahman, who was then about thirty- 
two years of age, was formally made Amir. The 
ceremony took place in the Salaam khana, outside 
the walls of the Arak palace, in the presence of all 
the princes, officials, principal army officers, chiefs, 
and khans of tribes. There was no display of colour, 
and the princes, officials, and others who had them 
wore black clothes, while others had white clothes 
and some those of a dark colour. [t is not the 
Afghan custom to wear black as mourning, except on 
the death of a king, and it is then worn for three 
days. The ceremony consisted of two parts, the 
religious and the civil. 

The religious ceremony was performed by the 
chief moullah of the Juma Musjid, and was com- 
menced by all those present joining in prayers. 
Then the moullah wound a lungi (headcloth) of 
white muslin round the Sirdar's head, after which the 
Koran and holy relics of the Prophet (a coat and 

132 



Amir Abdur Rahman 

some hair) and a flag from the tomb of a saint were 
presented him, after which the moullah announced 
him to be the duly elected Amir of Afghanistan. 
The flag from the tomb of a saint was one brought 
by the late Amir from a holy grave in Turkistan, 
all such graves having poles on which small flags and 
streamers are fastened, stuck in the ground around 
them. The late Amir had camped near by when on 
his way from Russia to Kabul, and during the night 
had dreamed that he would be successful in his quest 
for the throne of Afghanistan, and so had brought 
one of the flags from the grave as both a memento 
and a charm. 

The civil ceremony was performed by Sirdar Nas- 
rullah (the new Amir's full brother), who placed the 
late Amir's hat on the new Amir's head. This hat 
was of black Astrakan skin, and on one side of it was 
the diamond star, presented to the late Amir by the 
members of the royal family on the occasion of his 
receiving the title of " Light of Religion and Faith." 
The late Amir's belt was next fastened round his 
waist and his father's sword was presented him. The 
hat, sword, and belt which had previously been worn 
by the new Amir, were given to Sirdar Nasrullah, 
and Sirdar Nasrullah's hat, sword, and belt were given 
to Sirdar Mahomed Omar, who was the youngest 
son. The Amir then made a speech, in which he 
said that he intended to hold the country intact, 
to resent foreign aggression, and to put in hand such 
reforms that the people of the country would become 

133 



Under the Absolute Amir 

prosperous, and he would also abolish the hated spy 
system, which had till then prevailed, and by which 
no man was safe. A great cheer was raised on this, a 
very unusual thing for the Afghans, but the abolition 
of the spy system meant peace and security for them 
all. The oath of allegiance to the Amir was then 
sworn on the Koran by all those present, and the 
ceremony ended in the customary way by all par- 
taking of food. For weeks afterwards the city was 
full of men from different parts of the country, chiefs 
of tribes, governors of cities, head men of villages, 
etc., all come to take the oath of allegiance to the 
Amir, and to all who did so, the customary " khilat " 
or robes of honour were given. These are something 
in the fashion of cloaks, made of brown, blue, or 
green cloth and embroidered with gold braid. Some 
of the men were so poor that they were dressed 
in little better than rags, which were washed clean 
for the occasion, and wore mocassins of undressed 
leather instead of boots, and they all looked a little 
sheepish and yet proud, as they strolled about the 
streets in their khilat. Many tailors are constantly 
kept at work in Kabul making khilats, which are 
given to any one whom the Amir desires to honour, 
and some of the khilats are very rich, being made of 
a fine hand-stitched cloth imported from Cashmere, 
and heavily embroidered with gold lace and lined 
with silk and fur. These khilats cost many hundreds 
of rupees. 

All the leading moullahs of the country were 

134 



Amir Abdur Rahman 

collected in Kabul, and to them khilats were also 
given, and the new Amir paid them much attention, 
for the moullahs are an influential section of the 
community, who are able to sway the minds of the 
people and lead them in any direction they choose. 
Three or four of the oldest and holiest of the 
moullahs were appointed to stop at the late Amir's 
tomb and pray there, and it was afterwards said by 
some of the people that the tomb, to which all had 
access to pray for his soul, had blue flames coming 
out of it, and this was a sure proof that his spirit 
was in Hades. However, the tomb was three times 
set on fire by some persons unknown who wished 
to disgrace it, and that caused it to be commonly 
said that the heat of the Amir's soul was the cause 
of the fires. It was impossible for an able ruler 
like the late Amir to forcibly bring a lawless people 
into the right way of behaviour without making 
many hate as well as fear him, and those who feared 
him when alive were not slow to try and disgrace 
his name when dead, and beyond the power of 
retaliation. 

The soldiers, however, were far from satisfied 
and content, and on the day Sirdar Habibullah 
was proclaimed Amir before all the troops, the 
Momundzai regiment raised the battle cry, but it 
was not taken up by other regiments and nothing 
came of it. The men of the Ardeel regiment, who 
were against any disturbance or revolt, were repeatedly 
asked by other regiments to join them in rising, 

135 



Under the Absolute Amir 

being told that if they did not do so, the rest of 
them could do nothing, for the rising must be 
universal, and they did not want to fight one against 
the other, but with the object of doing away with 
the present reigning family and getting other govern- 
ment, but the Ardeel regiment remained true to 
their king, and refused to have anything to do with 
it, but many of them were dissatisfied and inclined 
to side with the rest of the troops, most of whom 
openly said that if the English came into the country 
they would not fight for their present ruler, but 
would put down their arms and go over to them. 
The new Amir, to quell the discontent of the army, 
made known his intention of increasing the pay of 
all men, and I overheard some of the soldiers in 
the workshops discussing what they would do if 
he did not keep his promise, or the increase was 
not sufficient, and no doubt their attitude was 
representative. Their pay was eight rupees Kabuli 
a month (55. 4d), and one man said that nothing 
under twelve rupees a month would satisfy him, 
and if he did not get that he would join the others. 
The pay of the soldiers was raised soon afterwards 
to ten rupees Kabuli a month ; but the increase was 
considered insufficient, and the discontent continued, 
and on the following Koz-i-Eid, when Sirdar Nasrullah 
inspected the troops, in place of the Amir who was 
unwell, and gave the men the customary greeting 
in the name of the Amir, no one responded, and 
for a time the situation seemed critical, but Sirdar 

136 



Amir Abdur Rahman 

Nasrullah went on with the inspection as though 
nothing had happened, and the review passed off 
without anything further of an unpleasant nature 
occurring. 

The new Amir made many promises of reform 
which were not fulfilled, and the winter following 
his accession to the throne was a dry one, and 
practically no snow fell. This caused a failure of 
the supply of water from melted snow in the 
mountains which was necessary for irrigation during 
the ensuing spring, and consequently the crops 
failed. Famine of course followed, and very many 
of the people died of starvation. Then cholera came 
at the time food was scarcest, and thousands were 
carried off in a few weeks, and the general discontent 
among the people increased, for all the misery they 
suffered was put down to the Amir as being an unlucky 
ruler. Some plots aimed at the Amir's life were 
discovered, and the Amir kept himself close in Arak, 
and seldom showed himself, spending much time in 
the harem serai reading private reports from spies, 
and leaving the Government business to take care 
of itself, and this further increased the discontent. 
Also, fearing treachery, he allowed no one but 
specially appointed men to come into his presence, 
and for people who had complaints to make, he 
instituted a system whereby a stamped paper, on 
which to write an application, was to be purchased 
from the Kotwali office, and it was promised that 
such would receive attention. They were, when 

137 



Under the Absolute Amir 

written, to be placed in a box outside the Kotwali 
station, whence they would be collected by the 
Kotwal daily and forwarded on to him. But the 
people complained that although it was stated that 
such applications would be answered at once, they 
had to pay for stamps and yet got no answer, or 
if an answer was given, it was indefinite and neither 
granted nor refused their request, so eventually the 
system fell into disrepute, for the people argued, 
why spend money on a stamp when it is most 
probable that we shall get no redress ? 

Under the late Amir it was usual for people to be 
allowed to present petitions when meeting him on the 
road, or returning from the musjid on a Friday (the 
Mussulman Sunday), and this he encouraged, and he 
even went so far when he first came to the throne as 
to call all men, even sweepers, " brother." The new 
Amir, however, would not allow it, and had pro- 
clamation made that any man who petitioned him on 
the road would be imprisoned, and this was done to 
some who disregarded the order. The consequence 
was that the people felt themselves cut off from their 
king, for they could get no speech with him, and their 
written complaints were neglected, so they must suffer, 
whatever happened, without hope of redress, and then 
they lost heart, and that the Amir Sahib had for- 
gotten and cared nothing for them. The Afghans, in 
many things, are a long-suffering people, and their 
religion, which teaches them that the Amir is their 
spiritual head, and may do as it so pleases him, is no 

138 



Amir Abdur Rahman 

doubt responsible for their putting up with a state of 
affairs which would cause any other people to take 
matters into their own hands ; but they are very 
clannish, and will suffer from one of their own chiefs 
that which would rouse them to frenzy from any 
one else. 

The present Amir is fond of outdoor sports, and, 
considering his bulk, for although not more than five 
and a half feet in height he is very stout and broad 
and has rather short legs, he can stand a good deal 
of exercise. His principal amusement is cooking, and 
this is general with all other men of the country, and 
it is said that he can cook better than those appointed 
for the work. Fridays are usually devoted to this 
amusement, all his retinue helping in the preparation 
of the viands, which, when cooked, they sit down and 
eat together. The Amir also drives his own dog- 
cart at times, and occasionally goes out hawking and 
shooting. Formerly, when game was plentiful, he 
not infrequently used to camp out for a few days, 
but since his coming to the throne he has done very 
little shooting, and then of an evening only. 

Once, towards the end of the cholera epidemic, he 
went out to his shooting-box at Pul-i-Bagrami, about 
six miles north-east of Kabul, and stayed there for 
several weeks, his attendants, together with the 
officials and guards, having to live under canvas, 
where they had a cold time of it as the winter 
approached. While there, one of the state elephants 
went "mast" (mad) and, killing his mahout, raged 

139 



Under the Absolute Amir 

through the camp, putting all to flight who came in 
his way. The Amir's shagrassi, a relation of his own, 
and by way of being a bit mad-headed himself, called 
to the Amir that he would kill the elephant, and, 
seizing his sword and springing on his horse, he 
shouted to some twenty sowars or so to follow him, 
and together they charged over to the elephant, but 
the latter, when he saw them, charged them in turn. 
The Afghan horses cannot stand elephants, and scat- 
tered in all directions when they saw him coming 
down on them, and for the next few minutes the 
scene was a lively one, with the elephant chasing 
first one and then the other, while the frantic efforts 
of men and horses to get out of the way, jumping 
ditches and watercourses, and crashing through the 
hedges of young trees about, caused a good deal of 
laughter from the onlookers in spite of the danger 
they ran. Eventually the elephant was lured to a 
deep pit which had been dug for him and covered 
over with boughs and grass, and there he fell in and 
lay, trapped. After some consultation it was decided 
to give the elephant four pounds of camphor, four 
pounds of opium, and four pounds of chirs (a prepara- 
tion from hemp something like opium), to quieten its 
lust ; and this was done. Next morning the elephant 
was dead, and this was an unlooked-for result, although 
it was a natural one when the quantities of the drugs 
are considered ; however, the Afghans believe in large 
doses of medicine to effect a real cure. 

Amir Habibullah Khan takes an interest in tennis 
140 



Amir Abdur Rahman 

and cricket, but mostly in cricket, for it resembles the 
national game of toopbazee, which is also played with 
a ball and flat stick. Another amusement the Amir 
is interested in besides cooking is the magic lantern, 
for which he has thousands of slides, including those 
which give photos of all the most interesting places 
in the world. I presented him with a cinematograph, 
first giving, on two successive nights, an exhibition 
in one of the durbar rooms in Arak. The cinemato- 
graph was installed in an ante-room, the audience, 
with the Amir, being in the large durbar room with 
a wetted screen placed in the doorway communicating 
between them on which to project the pictures. The 
first evening, when everything was ready, the Amir 
was informed and came into the room where I had 
the apparatus fixed, and asked me to show him the 
working of it. I did so, and he then retired to the 
larger room to witness the performance ; but before 
allowing the entertainment to proceed he charged an 
entrance fee to all who were allowed to come into the 
room of ten rupees each for those provided with seats 
and five rupees for those who had to stand. When 
I heard this I thought it probable that I should be 
given a share of it as a reward for giving the enter- 
tainment ; but he kept it all, and it rather typifies the 
character given him by his people. 



141 



CHAPTER IX 

PRISONS AND PRISONERS 

Kotwal and Kotwali (magistrate and police court) Policemen as thieves 
Description of prisons Description of how prisoners are treated 
and their irons The old well in Bala Hisar The spy system 
Cutting a man's throat False reporting Fanah (wedge) 
tortures. 

THE position of Kotwal (city magistrate) has from 
time immemorial been an office of high standing in 
the East. In some countries, the Kotwal has the 
power of ordering death, but in Afghanistan only the 
Amir can punish by the extreme penalty. One of 
the duties of the Kotwal, however, is to see that all 
executions, public and private, are carried out, also to 
conduct those tortures which are inflicted to make 
men confess their crimes, or the names of their 
confederates, and to see that all punishments for 
offences committed are properly administered. In 
addition he has to look after all city arrange- 
ments, to superintend the police, to try all cases 
brought before him, either criminal or civil, to 
receive the reports of and supervise the street kalan- 
turs (headmen), and keep a record of births and 
deaths. 

142 



Prisons and Prisoners 

The Kabul Kotwali office is built alongside the 
dome of the Arak bazar, the newest bazar in the city, 
which is close to the Arak palace, and where the best 
goods in Kabul are to be obtained. There are, 
besides the chief Kotwali office, several Kotwali 
(police) stations in the different streets in Kabul, and 
other police stations, which are principally for the 
purpose of stopping runaways, and to collect the 
custom duties on all goods entering the country, are 
placed along all the chief roads right up to the 
borders of neighbouring states, and in this way the 
police are able to keep a check on all persons leav- 
ing or entering the country. In Kabul itself all 
custom duties are collected by a special depart- 
ment appointed for that purpose. In each police 
station is a guard of seven Kotwali sepoys (police- 
men), including the havildar or sergeant, who is 
supposed to be a man who can write but very often 
cannot, and so has a friend or relation among the men 
with him who writes all reports. There are other 
officers higher in rank than the havildar, and all of 
them, officers and sepoys (police), follow the usual 
custom of the country in taking advantage of their 
position, in order to abstract money or goods from 
all the people they are brought into official contact 
with, and to invent excuses to do so in other cases. 
It is a common occurrence for a person caught in the 
act of committing an offence against the law to bribe 
the Kotwali sepoys to let him go free, and any of the 
sepoys will do this, provided there are no witnesses 

143 



Under the Absolute Amir 

who can give information to a higher officer and so 
make trouble. 

The policemen are themselves the greatest thieves 
in Kabul, and take anything they can get, great 
or small ; but they become most indignant when 
they see others stealing, considering it, perhaps, 
an encroachment on their privileges. In going 
along the bazar a policeman will take a handful of 
grain or fruit from a shop as he passes and eat it, 
and the shopkeeper must say nothing. If a shop- 
keeper should make a fuss over anything a policeman 
does in that way, it is more than probable that 
a case will be trumped up against him very shortly 
afterwards, and if there is nothing else to accuse him 
of, he is accused of giving short weight, and as there 
are few correctly made sets of metal weights in 
Kabul, those there are being made and used in the 
Government workshops and stores, the shopkeepers 
have to take stones of different sizes, and after 
matching them against the Government weights use 
them for weighing out the articles they deal in. 
These >stones are therefore readily changed by the 
policeman for others lying on the street, when taking 
a shopkeeper through the bazars to the Kotwal for 
trial, and when such convincing evidence is forth- 
coming, the shopkeeper is of course heavily fined, and 
for the future treats a Kotwali sepoy with every 
respect. In most of the robberies committed in 
Kabul, some of the Kotwali sepoys are concerned, 
their duties as policemen enabling them to mark the 

144 



Prisons and Prisoners 

most likely shop or house, and also to obtain correct 
information of the movements of the people in them. 

The Kotwali guards at the different stations are 
supposed to be changed every two weeks ; but when 
on guard at those places which give little work for 
them, or where they can more readily add to their 
income, they endeavour to be kept on there, and 
those who possess the favour of the Kotwal, manage 
to do this at times. These sepoys are the men 
employed by the Kotwal in the carrying out of 
executions and punishments, and those who happen 
to be on guard at the time are appointed for the 
work. Some of the younger sepoys are very sick 
after assisting in some horrible punishment, but use 
hardens them, and after a time they become callous 
to suffering in others, in some cases even to the 
extent of gloating over the death or tortures they are 
ordered to inflict on some miserable wretch. 

Outside the city are also soldier guards from 
various regiments, but these are mostly posted about 
Arak and the new part of the city. Both these 
guards and the Kotwali guards have, in the present 
Amir's time, been much increased, so that in some 
places one is challenged every hundred yards or so at 
night. Kotwali stations have also been lately placed 
on all roads about four miles out of the city to pre- 
vent any one leaving without a road pass, so that no 
one can now travel even five or six miles out into 
the country without permission. At times, on dis- 
tant stations, the Kotwali sepoy on guard is attacked 

145 L 



Under the Absolute Amir 

and killed at night for the sake of his rifle, and the 
body of one of them who was killed at Baber (which 
is only two miles south of the city), was hacked to 
pieces, possibly because he made a good fight for his 
life and injured some of his assailants. 

The prisons in Kabul are not buildings erected 
for that purpose, but any house belonging to the 
Government which is suitably situated is used as a 
prison, and continues in such use. Strong bars are 
fixed across the windows to prevent the escape of 
those who are confined there, and the outer door is 
made strong and padlocked, and has a guard of 
Kotwali sepoys stationed inside it. The space at 
disposal in such houses is very inadequate to the 
number of prisoners ; but that is not regarded at all 
by the authorities, who would laugh at the idea of 
properly housing such animals as prisoners, nor do 
they insist on the prisons being kept clean, or in any 
way healthy. There is absolutely no thought of 
sanitation, and the prisoners are herded together in a 
house that has perhaps been used as a prison for 
twenty or thirty years, and never cleaned. Con- 
sequently, typhus and other diseases are common 
among prisoners, and typhus alone will very often 
sweep off seventy to eighty per cent, of the men 
confined there, and the wonder is that all do 
not die. 

A. man who was in prison for some years described 
it to me. He and his father and some other rela- 
tions were chained together, and so brought from a 

146 



Prisons and Prisoners 

distance to Kabul, charged with some political offence, 
and put in prison there. It is very seldom that 
prisoners charged with such offences are tried at 
once, if at all, so they lay in prison for some years, 
and had no hope of ever getting out, for their rela- 
tions and friends feared to bring the matter to the 
notice of the Amir in case they should themselves 
incur his displeasure. The room they were confined 
in was a small one, and they, with the other prisoners, 
were about thirty in number, and, when lying down 
at night, there was only sufficient space for them to 
lie in rows, side by side. Sanitary arrangements 
there were none, and at length typhus broke out, and 
one after another succumbed to it, his father and 
some of his brothers and cousins being carried out 
for burial among others. He himself was ill with 
the fever for weeks, but recovered, and when the 
disease at last stopped, there were only five of them 
left out of the original number. Other prisoners 
were, however, brought in, and the room was packed 
again very shortly, and some of these got the fever 
from time to time and died. 

At that time also, a number of prisoners were 
being secretly disposed of, and almost every night a 
man would be called from their number, and going 
away with his jailers, was never heard of again. 
This made the rest of them live in terror, for no man 
knew but what his turn might come the next night. 
Eventually the strain was too much for them, and 
they determined on revolt and escape, as death in 

147 



Under the Absolute Amir 

trying to escape was no worse than sitting and 
waiting for it to come to them. So one night, about 
three o'clock, when the guard was known to be lax 
and most of the soldiers asleep, they got out of the 
room and made their way to the gate. Here the 
man on guard saw them and fired, dropping one 
man, but before he could reload, a huge Afghan who 
led the prisoners, took him across his knee and broke 
his back, and then seized the rifle and bayonet. The 
rest of the guard were roused by the noise, and a 
short fight ensued, and several of the guard being 
killed, the others fled ; but some of the prisoners also 
suffered during the struggle. The door of the prison 
was now unguarded, and the prisoners escaped, but 
the guards who had run away had warned others, 
and they had not gone far along the streets before 
these were upon them, both in front and behind, and 
after a struggle they were overpowered and taken 
back to the prison. For this several were hanged, 
the big Afghan among them, and the rest had such 
heavy chains put on them that they could hardly 
move. It was not until several years had elapsed 
that the man who told me the foregoing was released ; 
but eventually his friends brought his case to the 
notice of the Amir, and as there was no proof against 
him, and the governor who had imprisoned him had 
been hanged, he was released, but his health was 
shattered, and he died a few years later. 

The food given by Government to the prisoners 
is bread, two nans (flat loaves weighing about half a 

148 



Prisons and Prisoners 

pound each) being given daily, one in the morning 
and one at night. This is far from sufficient, and if 
a prisoner has no friends or relations to send him 
either food or money, he is in a bad way. Towards 
each other, however, the prisoners, and all the poor 
people generally, are very good, and a man who has 
food to eat, however little, will offer some of it to 
another who has none. Prisoners have leg-irons 
fastened round their ankles to hamper their move- 
ments and render any attempt at escape more diffi- 
cult, but the hands, except in case of a man being 
taken to execution or as a special punishment, are 
free. In all cases prisoners are treated by their 
guards with great severity, and the prisoner who 
does not do at once as he is ordered, gets the butt- 
end of a rifle in the small of his back as a reminder. 
From what I have seen I should imagine that a street 
dog's life is a happy one compared to theirs. 

Of all the prisons, the worst and most dreaded 
is the old well in Bala Hisar. This is an old well 
which has been excavated through rock, with the 
bottom part widened out to some fifteen or twenty 
feet in diameter, and having over the mouth of the 
well a hut, in which a guard of sepoys is kept. In 
this underground hole men are imprisoned for life 
for very heinous offences (in the eyes of the autho- 
rities), and live and die there, the bodies of the dead 
being left where they lie together with the living. 
There are no sanitary arrangements of course, for 
none but prisoners are lowered down, and those who 

149 



Under the Absolute Amir 

are put down stop there. Food (bread and water) 
is lowered by a rope once a day to those below, 
but there are few whose minds or health do not 
give way in a short time, and most 'of the men 
imprisoned very soon end their days by dashing 
themselves against the rock, until they become un- 
conscious and die, for the solitude and horror of it 
all drives them mad. The bottom of the well is 
dark, and the only light which penetrates is from 
the mouth above, and no sound from the outer world 
can reach those imprisoned there, while the stench 
and foulness of the atmosphere is horrible, and is 
itself sufficient to cause death. There is a man, 
however, who is said to have been there for fifteen 
years or more, but he is quite mad, and unconscious 
of his surroundings. When the Amir died, the 
present ruler gave orders that those in the well 
should be taken out, and brought before him. There 
were three who were alive, and their appearance 
was not prepossessing, for their faces had a dead, 
white look, and their eyes seemed to be blind in the 
daylight, while their hair and beards were long and 
matted, and the hair falling over their faces gave 
them a wild, animal look, which their finger-nails 
increased, for they were long and more like talons. 
The Amir ordered the men to be released, but some 
three weeks after again ordered them to be taken 
back to the well, the representations of others having 
convinced him that his father's action in so im- 
prisoning them was just. 

150 



Prisons and Prisoners 

When the late Amir came to the country from 
Russia, he brought with him an admiration of the 
Russian spy system, and incorporated it into his 
system of government. Consequently, every fourth 
man was a "reportchee " (spy), who sent in his 
private reports to the Amir. These spies were of 
all classes and ranks, and every large house had 
one or two spies among the servants who reported 
all they saw and heard, and as it is the custom of 
the country for servants to sit in the same room as 
their master, where they sit near the door to show 
their inferior position, and as they are allowed to 
express their opinion on any subject which their 
master and his friends may be discussing, they of 
course hear all that is said at any time, and 
should they be sent out of the room while their 
master speaks to any guest in private, then that 
itself would be unusual and suspicious enough to 
warrant reporting to the Amir. The Amir had 
spies in the houses of his sons, and among the 
women of their harems, and spies in his own harem 
too, while his wives and his sons in their turn, 
had their spies among his servants, who informed 
them of all that concerned themselves. It was an 
expensive system, and one of which the spies un- 
scrupulously took advantage to make false reports 
against those they hated or feared, and have them 
put out of the way. Also for monetary considera- 
tions they would similarly dispose of another man's 
enemy. 



Under the Absolute Amir 

The offence which in the eyes of the late Amir 
was the most deadly and unforgivable was the writ- 
ing by any one of reports concerning himself and his 
country to the Indian Government, and this was the 
favourite accusation of those of his spies who had an 
enemy to dispose of, and they showed a good deal of 
cunning in the preparation of the plot whereby their 
victim should be doomed, without chance of escaping 
the Amir's vengeance, and devoted to it much 
thought and time. Their schemes were usually out- 
lined on the plan of following up their own report to 
the Amir, which gave details of how they became 
cognizant of the fact of the accused reporting to the 
English Government, and gave as proof the bogus 
letter or report alleged to have been found by them, 
by other reports, which they obtained by sending to 
their friends in India, and elsewhere, a draft of what 
they wanted written to the Amir, with instructions to 
copy it and send on to him a few weeks later. By 
these means they managed to get letters to the Amir 
from different places, each accusing their victim of 
being an English spy. And when one letter after 
another came, each one confirming the other, natur- 
ally the Amir was deceived, and it was not long 
before the accused was in prison, and there became 
lost, for his fate, though guessed at, was seldom 
known ; the custom being to remove such men at 
night, either by poison, bayonet, or cutting the 
throat. 

The method of cutting a man's throat is simple 
152 



Prisons and Prisoners 

but effective ; two men hold the man's arms, and 
force his head back, while another, or two more if the 
man is a strong one, hold his legs. The officer in 
charge then slices with his sword backwards and 
forwards across the man's throat until the gash 
is considered deep enough, and then the man is 
thrown on the ground and left to kick, as a fowl 
does under similar circumstances, until death occurs. 
In some cases the head is severed from the body in 
the same way, when the Amir's orders are to that 
effect. 

In other cases, when a man is ordered to be 
executed by having his throat cut, his grave is 
dug ready, and when the knife has done its work, 
he is thrown into it, and the earth is shovelled 
in at once, so that he is buried before death 
occurs. 

False reporting, when found out, was a great 
crime in the eyes of the Amir, and such men were 
speedily punished with death. In some cases where 
a man has been wrongly killed, the old well was 
given the offenders to consider their crimes in. I 
was once in the Amir's durbar, when fifteen or six- 
teen prisoners and others were brought in. Those 
who were prisoners were accused of false reporting, 
and the other men were their accusers, and six or 
seven of the prisoners had been submitted to the 
torture of the " fanah," which is administered as 
follows : A post, about six inches in diameter, is 
split into two pieces in the direction of its length, 



Under the Absolute Amir 

and the two halves are put together again, and bound 
with rope for one half of the length, so that when 
finished it somewhat resembles a huge clothes-peg. 
The bound end of the post is firmly fixed in the 
ground, with the split part projecting above the 
surface, and the foot of the person to be tortured is 
tied to the upper end of it with thin cords, which 
pass round both the foot and the post, and a 
Y-shaped wedge is inserted in the slit at the top. 
Then, when the wedge is hammered down, it makes 
the two halves of the post widen out, and puts a 
strong tension on the cord, which binds the foot and 
post together. When using this instrument of 
torture the wedge is tapped down until the cord 
exercises a slight pressure on the foot, and then the 
questions concerning the matter requiring confession 
are asked, and if the tortured one refuses to speak, 
the wedge is hammered down a little further, 
making the pressure of the cord still tighter on the 
foot, and so the wedge continues to be hammered 
down until the sufferer reveals all he knows (and 
sometimes much that he does not know, in order to 
save further torture), or until the toes are practically 
severed from the foot, when the other foot is similarly 
treated. There are many who have lost their toes 
through mortification setting in afterwards, under 
the torture of the "fanah," without confessing what 
they knew, and this speaks well for the endurance of 
the average Afghan, but the boast of the true Afghan 
is that he can endure pain, even to death, without a 

154 



Prisons and Prisoners 

sigh or sound, and some do so. Another form of 
torture is to cover the top of the head with dough, 
which is turned up at the edges to form a cup, and 
into the cup so formed, boiling oil is poured ; the 
agony as the brain begins to bake may be imagined. 
There are other forms of torture also, but these 
cannot be described. 

In this case the men who were brought before 
the Amir, after undergoing the " fanah " torture, 
were hardly able to stand, and their feet were 
swathed in bandages and rags, and one of them fell 
in a faint while the examination was on, but the 
Amir said he was shamming, and told the guards 
with them to make him stand up ; so they struck 
him savagely with the butt ends of their rifles, and 
kicked him back to consciousness, but he looked 
ghastly ill, and swayed about as he stood. Eventually, 
after the hearing of much contradictory evidence, 
several were ordered to be hanged, and the others to 
be imprisoned, pending decision as to their punish- 
ment. One of the condemned men stopped as he 
was being led away, and cursed the Amir, wishing 
him every evil he could think of; but the guards 
struck him across the mouth several times, and 
dragged him out. The Amir looked at the man with 
his teeth showing in the savage grin he had when 
angered, but, after a few moments, smiled and turned 
to me, and spoke on other matters, apparently having 
dismissed all thought of what had taken place from 
his mind. But to sentence a few men to death, and 

155 



Under the Absolute Amir 

listen to their views on the matter as they were 
led away, was no new experience for the Amir. 
Many men cursed him as they were being executed, 
for one of the national traits of character is vin- 
dictiveness. 



156 



CHAPTER X 

TORTURES AND METHODS OF EXECUTION 

Amir's iron rule Hanging by hair and skinning alive Beating to death 
with sticks Cutting men in pieces Throwing down mountain-side 
Starving to death in cages Boiling woman to soup and man drinking 
it before execution Punishment by exposure and starvation 
Saffold scenes Burying alive Throwing into soap boilers Cutting 
off hands Blinding Tying to bent trees and disrupting Blowing 
from guns Hanging, etc. 

THE Amir once told me, when speaking of the unruly 
character of the people, and the difficulty of making 
them, by the example of others who were punished, 
become peaceful and law-abiding, that he had ordered 
over a hundred thousand to be executed since the 
beginning of his reign, and that there were still 
others who thought they could set his laws at 
defiance. The Amir ruled his people with an iron 
hand, and, considering their character, such is 
necessary, if order is to be maintained. I was one 
day in durbar at the Bagh-i-bala palace, and one of 
the soldiers committed some offence, and was ordered 
to be brought in by the Amir, who inquired into the 
circumstances, and then instructed one of his officers 
to take the man down the hill adjoining the palace, 
and cut his throat there. This was done, and two 
little slaves boys, who went with the executioners 

157 



Under the Absolute Amir 

to see the tamasha, came back with white faces and 
trembling limbs. It was the first time they had seen 
such a sight, but those who were attached to the 
Amir's court, were not long in his service before 
becoming used to happenings of this sort. 

Although the Amir punished many small offences 
with death, he was not always enraged when one 
man killed another, unless the murdered person 
happened to be one whom he knew and liked, then 
his anger was ungovernable, and the murderer was 
generally ordered death in some particularly horrible 
manner. One of the slave boys, of whom the Amir 
was very fond, and had raised to a position of 
influence and power, and who consequently became 
arrogant and overbearing in manner to others, and 
so gained for himself a good many enemies, was 
shot by a soldier one evening while riding across 
the square in Sherpur cantonment. When the 
soldier was brought before the Amir, the latter, 
suspecting that he could have had no enmity against 
the slave boy, questioned him as to who instigated 
him to commit this deed, and the soldier refused 
to answer. This further enraged the Amir, and 
he gave orders that the man was to be tied to the 
bough of a tree by his hair in the palace garden, 
and so many square inches of skin taken off his 
body daily until he confessed. 

The man died on the third day without con- 
fessing anything to incriminate another, but the 
name of one of the generals was mentioned freely 

158 



Tortures and Methods of Execution 

by the people as the instigator of the crime, in 
revenge for the slave boy insulting him in the 
Amir's presence shortly before. 

Another case showing the severity of the Amir 
towards the relatives of those who escaped his 
vengeance was that of an old man brought before 
him, whose son had run away from the country. 
The old man's son, with two or three others, had 
been concerned in, or accused of, swindling the 
treasury, and knowing what was being said against 
them, and the fate in store should they be con- 
victed, they determined on escaping to India. The 
Kotwal, however, got wind of their intention, and 
came on the night proposed for escape with some 
twenty of his men, and posted them outside the 
gate, where some horses belonging to those in the 
house were standing ready saddled. The son, and 
those with him, discovering that the Kotwal and 
his men were lying in wait for them, determined 
on cutting through them, so, suddenly opening the 
door, they rushed out armed with swords and re- 
volvers. The Kotwal was not noted for personal 
courage, and the Kotwali sepoys generally are 
seldom courageous, perhaps through being of mixed 
races, and they gave way after one or two of their 
men had been cut down, and then the young fellows 
made a dash to the horses, and cutting down those 
who held them, mounted and got away, and were 
not heard of again. The father, who was left in 
the house, was seized by the Kotwal and taken to 

159 



Under the Absolute Amir 

the Amir, where, not knowing whether his son had 
escaped or not, he begged the Amir to forgive 
him, urging that he was guiltless of the crime of 
which others had accused him, and offered his own 
life if his son's might be spared, saying the Amir 
might kill him himself where he stood. The Amir, 
enraged at the young men escaping his vengeance, 
seized his stick and struck the old man down with 
it, and then ordered others there to go on beating 
him ; and in the Amir's presence the old man was 
thrashed until he was dead, and his body was after- 
wards exhibited on a charpai (bedstead) in the bazar 
for two days, as a warning to others. The Amir 
invariably punished the nearest relatives of those 
who ran away to escape punishment, and knowing 
this, many a man returned and gave himself up in 
order that his relatives might go free. 

Beating with sticks is a common punishment, 
so many blows being given on the man's back as 
he lies spreadeagled on the ground, two soldiers, 
one on either side, administering the blows, while 
others hold the man down, and sometimes the Amir 
orders the blows of such a number that the man 
shall die under the punishment. A master carpenter, 
who did not get on with the work ordered in a new 
part of the palace, was given a hundred and fifty 
blows with sticks, and died the day after, but the 
sticks used are at times so heavy that the bones of 
the back are broken and the flesh mortifies, so that 
a less number of blows will sometimes cause death. 

1 60 



Tortures and Methods of Execution 

The present Amir had fifteen Kotwali sepoys 
beaten for neglect of duty, in not reporting the 
transgressions of their superior officer, until eight 
of them died under the blows, and the others were 
unable to move for weeks after, and being kept in 
prison received no medical treatment to alleviate 
their sufferings. On a later occasion, when one of 
his attendants had committed some mischief, with 
the object of getting the blame put on another 
fellow-servant, and was detected, the Amir, who 
was at the time on the temporary roof covering the 
new palace in the Arak garden, had the man brought 
before him, and there beaten with sticks until partly 
insensible, then the man was hauled to the edge of 
the roof and thence thrown to the ground, after 
which he was dragged by a rope fastened to his 
legs from where he lay to the Kotwali, but life 
was extinct on arrival, though he was still living 
after being thrown from the roof. 

The present Amir is very scrupulous about all 
things surrounding him being kept clean and tidy, 
not only in the house and garden, but the roads 
leading to the palace must be kept swept and clean 
too. He was one day passing out of one of the 
smaller gates in the wall of the Arak garden, and 
noticed that the ground round the gateway was 
unswept ; so, stopping there, he sent for the man 
whose duty it was to sweep the place. A woman 
came in reply, and said that she was the man's wife, 
and her husband was too ill with fever to get up, and 

161 M 



Under the Absolute Amir ' 

she had been so busy attending him that she had 
found no time to sweep the place herself, and also she 
was, as he could see, heavy with child. The Amir 
replied that he would relieve her of her burden, and 
ordered the woman fifty strokes with sticks on the 
abdomen. The woman was accordingly laid on her 
back, on the ground, and beaten, and died almost 
immediately afterwards. 

The late Amir was very savage in punishing those^ 
who falsely reported his death. When.i t/he-^h^lera 
epidemic broke out in 190.0, the Amirrwe'nt to live at 
Paghman, which is situaied^at the foot of the Hindu 
Kush, while the epidemic was raging, for the Amir 
and all his family greatly fear cholera, and run 
away at once from the affected area. Towards the 
close of the epidemic, two men came in to Kabul from 
Paghman, and gave out in the bazars that the Amir 
was dead of the disease ; and when the Amir returned 
to the city a few days after, he had these men caught 
and brought before him, and said the wish was 
certainly father to the report which they had spread ; 
so he ordered them to be cut in pieces, and their 
remains to be exhibited in the bazars as a warning to 
others. On another occasion when he had again 
been reported dead, he ordered the man who spread 
the report to be taken to the top of the Asman 
Heights, and there, on a part overlooking the river 
which is very precipitous, be put into a barrel and 
rolled down the mountain-side to the valley below. 
A similar case, but more brutally executed, was that 

162 



Tortures and Methods of Execution 

of an old man, a moullah, who had given out that the 
Amir was not a true Mussulman, and was ordered to 
be thrown down the mountain from the same point. 
When thrown over the cliff, by the Kotwali sepoys, 
his clothes caught on a jutting rock, which suspended 
him, and prevented further fall, and the sepoys, 
releasing the clothes, took the man back and threw 
him over again, this time successfully. 

The Amir, after the style of the Mikado of 
dramatic fame, always tried to let the punishment fit 
the crime, although his punishments were sometimes 
such as to make one think that he greatly exagger- 
ated the crime. For instance, a man who stole the 
food of some poor children, leaving them nothing, was 
put in a cage, in the bazar, and there starved ; but to 
make the punishment fit his crime more closely, bread 
and water were brought to him two or three times 
each day, and placed just out of his reach, and this was 
continued until the man died of starvation. 

In another case, a man and a woman, who loved 
not wisely but too well, both being married people, 
determined on running away together, hoping there- 
by to secure their future, happiness in each other's 
society, but in their endeavour to reach India, where 
they intended living together, they were caught and 
brought back. The Amir, in ordering their punish- 
ment, said that, as the man was so fond of the woman, 
he should have her as completely as was possible. So 
the woman was thrown alive into a huge cauldron of 
boiling water, and boiled down to soup, and a basin 

163 



Under the Absolute Amir 

of this soup was given to the man, who was forced to 
drink it, and after drinking it he was hanged. In 
this case the Amir's object was to punish, not only in 
this life, but in the next, for a cannibal cannot enjoy 
the delights of Paradise as depicted in the Koran. 

Another man and woman, who were caught in 
the act of loving unwisely, were, by the order of the 
Amir, who appropriately said he would let them 
live together until death, put on top of the Asman 
Heights, tied back to back with ropes, and kept 
there until they died of exposure and starvation, 
and sepoys were put on guard to see that no one 
interfered with the fulfilment of the punishment. 
The woman died first, and the man was allowed a 
day longer to die in, but as he lingered he was 
helped on his journey. 

In ordinary cases, when a man and woman are 
caught, as in the last instance, both are ordered to 
be taken to the scaffold, and there the rope is 
adjusted round the man's neck ready for him to be 
strung up, and he stands there while the woman is 
put in a sack, the mouth of which is tied, and the 
sepoys thrust their bayonets through it and the 
woman until no further cry being heard it is known 
that death has occurred; then the man, who has 
witnessed his mistress's death, is hauled up and 
hanged. In similar cases where the relatives of 
the ruling family are implicated, the man is im- 
prisoned, and no one knows what becomes of him, 
except that he is never heard of again, and the 

164 



Tortures and Methods of Execution 

woman is blinded or has her nose cut off, or some 
similar disfiguring punishment is inflicted, and after 
the punishment she is allowed to die or get well 
as nature orders without being nursed ; mostly they 
die, and it is said that those who were once fond of 
them, help them to death with a dose of poison, 
which is perhaps the kindest thing they could do. 

It is a common matter for a man who has grave 
suspicion that his wife is unfaithful to cut off her 
nose ; sometimes they bite it off, as a sign to all of 
her unfaithfulness, and to spoil her beauty. This is, 
of course, when the lover cannot be located, and 
there are no proofs obtainable of her wrong-doing. 

In those cases where men were convicted of 
outraging girls or women, the Amir was very 
savage in his punishments. In one case three men, 
so convicted, were buried in the ground up to their 
chins, and left there until dead, after which the 
dogs were allowed to come and eat them, or as 
much as they could get of them. For the body 
to be eaten by dogs is regarded as worse than the 
punishment causing death, because it cuts off all 
hope of Paradise. 

"To fit the crime," the Amir has in some cases 
where men are very much married, and are too 
fond of spending most of their time with their wives 
to the neglect of their Government duties, given 
camphor to the men as a punishment, camphor being 
known in the country to be antiphrodisiac. 

As a means of putting a stop to the constant 



Under the Absolute Amir 

robbing of Government money in the different fac- 
tories, the late Amir had some men who were in 
charge of the soap shops and were convicted of 
swindling, thrown alive into the soap boiler (which 
is one of a large capacity) when in full blast, to 
make up the deficit by boiling them down into 
soap. The Amir also had men thrown into boil- 
ing oil on occasions ; but this was as a punish- 
ment, and had nothing to do with the manner of the 
crime. 

To punish stealing, one of the usual penalties 
ordered by the Amir, besides hanging, was to have 
the hand cut off. On the occasion of my first visit 
to Kabul in 1889, I was given tents in the garden 
adjoining the workshops to live in, it being summer 
time ; and one day one of the workmen, who are 
always searched before being allowed to pass through 
the gate when work is over, was found to have a 
piece of leather the size of a man's hand concealed 
under his coat. The Amir ordered the man to be 
hanged in the factory as a warning to the others, 
but on representations being made to him by the 
Englishmen who were working in the shops, the 
Amir commuted the sentence to the man's hand 
being cut off. Hands are cut off by a butcher, and 
usually the stumps, when the hands are off, are 
plunged into boiling oil to stop the hemorrhage. 
This workman died a couple of days afterwards. 

Another common punishment is that of blinding 
people. This is the usual punishment of those who 

1 66 



Tortures and Methods of Execution 

try to escape from prison or from the country- 
synonymous terms almost. The manner of doing 
this is to lance the pupils of the eyes, and then put 
in a drop of nitric acid, and, to guarantee no sight 
being left, quicklime is afterwards added. The 
agony endured must be frightful, and in one case 
when fifteen men were blinded together in Sherpur 
cantonment, where these punishments are usually 
carried out, the men were seen on the third day after 
being blinded all chained one to the other, and sit- 
ting in a row on the ground ; they were unable to go 
elsewhere to obey the calls of nature, and conse- 
quently were filthy beyond description. Three of 
them were lying dead still chained to the living, and 
some of the living, too, were lying unconscious, while 
the others were moaning and rocking themselves 
backwards and forwards. 

Kunning away was not always punished with 
blinding, as was exemplified in the case of five Kafri 
boys. These boys, who were part of the regiment 
formed of the prisoners brought from Kafristan after 
that country was taken by the Amir, tried to get 
away to India, for Kabul and enforced Mohammedan- 
ism were little liked by them ; but they were caught 
while doing so and brought back. As a punishment 
the Amir ordered the Kafri regiment to be paraded 
and the boys bayoneted in front of their fellows. 
There had been a good deal of dissatisfaction among 
the Kafris, and the Amir probably deemed a severe 
example necessary. 



Under the Absolute Amir 

One form of execution, but which is very rarely 
used, is to bend the tops of two young trees towards 
each other and fasten them to the ground. The 
person to be executed is tied, one leg and arm to 
one tree, and the other leg and arm to the other tree, 
and, when all is ready, the ropes binding the trees 
down are cut simultaneously, and the body of the 
person tied to them is disrupted. 

There are three common methods of execution in 
use blowing from guns, hanging, and bayoneting. 

The latter is mostly done in the prisons at night, 
when those to be executed are taken by guards to 
some secluded spot, such as the rased portion of Bala 
Hisar, and there bayoneted, their bodies being 
afterwards thrown into an old well or ditch close by, 
and earth thrown over them. 

When a person is ordered to be blown from a 
gun, he is taken to the one which is fired daily to 
announce the hour of midday, and is fixed on a small 
hill close to the Sherpur cantonment. He is there 
tied to the gun in such a manner that his back is 
against the muzzle, and on the explosion of the 
charge the greater part of his body is blown into 
pieces. Blowing from guns is a punishment intended 
to strike terror into the hearts of others, but it is no 
doubt a preferable death to other forms of execution, 
inasmuch as it is sudden. Men who rob or swindle 
Government funds are served this way, and the 
Amin-Nizam, or paymaster to the army, is some- 
times the central figure on these occasions, also 

168 



Tortures and Methods of Execution 

highway robbers and spies frequently end their days 
by being scattered from the gun. 

For hanging the ordinary gallows is used, i.e. 
there is no drop given to break the neck, the man 
being hauled up by means of a pulley and hanged till 
he dies of strangulation. Two gallows are used, one 
T shaped, and very high, is for a man who is hanged 
and left hanging until the following day ; the body 
being left on the gallows as a warning to others. 
The other is a frame similar to the frame of a table 
with the top planking removed, the legs being fixed 
in the ground, and each side of the square so formed, 
has three or four wooden pulleys depending from it, 
over which the ropes pass for hauling the body up. 
It sometimes happens that several have to be executed 
at one time and this gallows was made large enough 
to take sixteen persons together. Those who are 
condemned to be hanged are not blindfolded at the 
time of execution ; their arms are tied to the body by 
a rope which passes over the arms above the elbows, 
and their legs are secured above the ankles. While a 
man is being hanged, his forearms work up and down, 
one after the other, struggling to break the cords and 
get at the rope round his neck, until he becomes 
unconscious, and it is a rather gruesome sight to 
watch his fruitless struggles to relieve the agony of 
strangulation. On one occasion a burly Afghan who 
was being hanged managed to break the rope binding 
his arms, and then clutching the rope, above his neck, 
pulled himself up and let go again, probably with the 

169 



Under the Absolute Amir 

intention of ending the torture by breaking his neck ; 
but the rope broke instead, and the man fell to the 
ground, and lay partly unconscious at the foot of the 
gallows for twenty minutes or so, while another rope 
was being brought from the bazar, and when that 
arrived, he was again strung up, and the execution 
completed. On another occasion when a man was 
being hanged the rope broke three times, and each 
time a new rope had to be brought from the bazar. 
When the third rope broke, those standing by said it 
was a sign from God that the man was innocent and 
should not be hanged, and the officer in charge of the 
execution despatched a messenger to the Amir with 
the particulars of the case, and asked if the man was 
to be reprieved ; but the Amir's message came back 
that the man must be hanged as ordered, so they had 
no alternative but to pull the man up for the fourth 
time and hang him until he was dead. 

The lesser punishments for offences committed, 
besides those already mentioned, vary according to 
the caprice or humour of the Amir. In some cases 
noses are cut off, beards are plucked out, men are made 
to stand for several days and nights without moving. 
Snuff is rubbed into the eyes, and in different other 
ways they are made to feel the Amir's displeasure. 
Any butcher who* was convicted of giving short weight 
was, by Amir Shere Ali's orders, nailed by the ear to 
the door of his shop. 

In one case, where false witnesses were produced 
before the Amir, and were detected, the emissaries of 

170 



Tortures and Methods of Execution 

the man who engaged these witnesses at a certain 
price each to give false evidence were ordered to be 
hanged by the heels in the Arak bazar from sunrise 
to sunset for eight days ; but the men had friends, 
and the power of money is great, so the police sepoys 
allowed them to rest with their chests on the ground 
and legs up in the air until some officer was seen 
approaching, when they were hauled clear of the 
ground until he had passed, and were then lowered 
again, but even with all this indulgence, the men 
fainted several times. The strange part of the 
sentence lay in the punishment of the man who 
wanted, and paid for, the false witnesses, for he was 
fined only. No man knows the mind of the Amir, 
they say in Kabul, and it would be interesting to know 
by what process of reasoning the chief offender was 
considered less guilty than those who did his bidding. 
Another punishment, which was also a huge joke 
in the court for many months, was that of a slave 
boy who had asked the Amir several times to give 
him a wife, until at last the Amir said, "Yes." 
It was a usual thing for the Amir to give a slave 
girl from his harem for a favourite slave boy to 
marry. The marriage of this boy was celebrated in 
the usual way ; a large khirgah or bamboo tent was 
fixed in the palace garden for the use of the newly 
married couple on the night of the ceremony, and all 
passed off with the firing of guns and feasting, as is 
usual. When at last the bridegroom hurried to the 
tent to see his bride for the first time face to face 

171 



Under the Absolute Amir 

(the bride is never seen by the bridegroom until after 
the marriage ceremony is over), he found the tent 
in darkness, but passed in. Shortly afterwards he 
rushed out yelling, and fled to the Amir's presence, 
saying that a great calamity had befallen him, and 
that it was a shaitan and not a woman he had 
married. It transpired that the Amir, to punish the 
boy's importunity, had secretly ordered another of 
his slave boys to be dressed up and put in the place 
of a girl during the ceremony. 



172 



CHAPTER XI 

LIFE OF EUROPEANS IN KABUL 

Life in Kabul Houses and gardens Guards and danger from " Ghazis " 
Allowances given wives Servants and swindling. 

I HAVE often been asked, " But didn't you find it 
lonely in Kabul " ? and in giving an affirmative 
answer, the memory of the many weary hours spent 
alone after worktime is always brought back to me. 
In the loneliness of life in Kabul lies its worst 
feature, and the effect on one of living such a life 
for several years is far from beneficial, but the 
extent of the ill effect produced is not properly 
estimated until one returns to civilization. There 
is no social intercourse between the Afghans and 
Europeans, the utmost in this way being a cere- 
monious call, on some feastday, by those who are 
well disposed towards the English, and this is 
generally a compliment for which a substantial 
return is expected by those who pay it. 

The loneliness is worse in the winter than in the 
summer, for then the days are short, and the even- 
ings from four o'clock until bedtime seem inter- 
minable, and it gets worse as the winter progresses, 
for there is little to make time pass but read, and 

*73 



Under the Absolute Amir 

one gets tired of that when there is nothing else to 
do for several hours each day, and especially so 
when there is seldom a new book to read. I used to 
welcome work which necessitated the preparation of 
plans and drawings, because I could do these after 
nightfall and make the time pass more quickly ; and 
when all else failed as a means of amusement, I got 
one of the clocks and took it to pieces and cleaned it, 
and otherwise damaged it. Another work I left for 
the evening was the analysis of ores which were sent 
from all parts of the country to the Amir, who 
passed them on to me, and I was glad of them as a 
means of making time pass. Altogether it is very 
different to what it is in India or England, where the 
evenings may be passed pleasantly in so many ways. 
In Kabul there is no amusement that one does not 
make for one's self, and there is not much to make 
amusement out of, unless one cares to make a joke of 
tragedies. On Fridays and holidays the day may be 
spent in shooting, for most of the summer months 
quail and blue pigeon can be got in the fields 
outside the city, and in the winter there are plenty 
of duck and snipe to be found on the chamans. The 
chamans are flat stretches of ground in the valleys, 
which are partly covered with water, where grass and 
weed abound for water-fowl. The birds, though, are 
very much hunted, and are consequently very wild ; 
but they afford the better sport on that account, as 
being much more difficult to shoot. The late Mr. 
Fleischer, who was in Kabul during the last three 

174 



Life of Europeans in Kabul 

years I spent there (he was murdered by the officer 
of his Afghan escort on his way to India in November, 
1904), used to join me on Fridays, and we made a 
practice of spending the day on the chamans. We 
used to take eight or ten sepoys with us, as a guard 
is always necessary, and the men were useful for 
putting up the game, and we also had lunch brought 
out to us with kettles and other things necessary to 
make tea, so that we could picnic on the shooting- 
ground comfortably, and although we seldom got a 
decent " bag," the sport was a welcome variation to 
the daily routine of life. In the springtime, when 
the duck and snipe shooting was over, and the quail 
had not come in, we fixed up running targets for 
rifle practice. The target consisted of a life-sized 
representation of leopard or deer, roughly daubed 
on paper, which was nailed to an upright frame 
fixed on a light trolly. A man using a long rope 
dragged this trolly over a short length of narrow- 
gauge rail, while running at full speed, and in front 
of the trolly run we made a fence of young trees, 
so that the target could be seen at intervals only. 
This made very good practice at eighty to a hundred 
yards for snap shooting. When tired of rifle practice, 
we used to take the native circular net and go fish- 
ing up the river. The fish obtainable in the river 
near Kabul are few and small, and one must go up 
the river for some miles if decent sized ones are 
wanted, so that we seldom got fish more than three 
inches in length, but although those we netted were 

175 



Under the Absolute Amir 

small, they were of a good flavour and resembled 
whitebait when cooked. The larger the Ifish were the 
less flavour they had. 

In the early part of my stay in Kabul I used 
to go for long rides about the country, generally 
unattended, for those were the days when Amir 
Abdur Rahman was full of vigour, and it was deemed 
unwise to meddle with one of his " Feringhees." I 
found, however, that I got enough riding in the 
ordinary course of my work, so after a time, I gave 
it up. Then I got a bicycle, and used to ride 
about the country around on that; but this, too, 
eventually became uninteresting when there was 
nothing fresh to see and the rides had no objective, 
and the day's work also was sufficient to keep me 
in good health so far as exercise went. I afterwards 
spent most of my time during the evening in the 
garden, except when there was quail shooting to 
be had in the fields close by, and I also found that 
for two hours before sunset numbers of blue pigeon 
used to fly over the garden in twos and threes, 
returning to their sleeping place from the fields and 
mountains, where they had been out feeding all day, 
and as this offered good amusement within easy 
reach, I spent most of the evenings, when I had 
nothing better to do, sitting in the garden waiting 
until one or another came within range. They 
afforded good practice, for blue pigeon fly fast, 
and, coming from in front and flying over one's 
head, they were more difficult to hit than birds 

176 



Life of Europeans in Kabul 

flying past on one side or the other. We also made 
a tennis court, and during the last two years were 
able to play most days until winter set in. One 
can play tennis in Kabul until nearly the end of 
December, when the snow begins to fall and stops 
further play until the following April. 

The house I had was one with six rooms below 
and six above. All the windows faced an inner 
courtyard, round the other sides of which ran the 
kitchen and servants' quarters, stables, hamam, etc. ; 
I had windows made on the outer side of the house 
also, so that I could not only get a view of the 
garden, but make the back rooms light enough to 
live in. The house was originally the harem serai 
in which some of Amir Shere Ali's wives lived, and 
it is the custom in building houses intended for the 
use of women to leave the outer walls without 
windows to ensure greater privacy. The windows 
are therefore always on the side which faces the 
inner courtyard. For the same reason the roofs 
of the houses, which are flat and are used by the 
women to enjoy the air in the evening, have a high 
wall round them so that they may not be seen by 
other men. 

We all had gardens attached to the houses given 
us, and mine was a large one ; the house, too, was 
a large one, and was situated on the outskirts of 
the city near Deh Afghanan, where there is land 
in plenty. I took a good deal of interest in the 
garden, and grew all sorts of vegetables : potatoes, 

177 N 



Under the Absolute Amir 

cabbage, cauliflower, cucumbers, melons, celery, 
asparagus, tomatoes, peas, beans, and other vegetables ; 
all did well in it. I also grew strawberries, of 
which fine crops of large fruit were yielded. But 
I got little or no fruit from the trees in the garden, 
for the seven Kotwali sepoys who formed the guard 
on the outer gate of the house most of the time I 
was there, took care to make away with all fruit 
as it ripened, and as they did so at night or while 
I was away oi\ my work I was unable to fasten 
the guilt ' on $iem, for although I cared little 
who had the fruit I was annoyed at it being 
stolen. > 

On one occasion J saw a single apple left in 
the thickest part pfi the foliage of one of the 
trees, and I sarcastically told the sepoys with me 
that I looked upon that apple as my share of the 
fruit, but I would leave it on the tree for a few 
more days until it ripened, and I asked them to 
see that it was left untouched. They said, " Ba 
chashim " (on my eyes be it) ; but the next day it 
was gone, and although all denied having touched 
it, no one but themselves had access to the garden. 
I mention this to show that the Kotwali sepoys 
cannot leave untouched anything they can put their 
hands on, provided there is a probability of the 
thief remaining undetected. On another occasion 
they stole the bridle of my horse, and as this was 
serious, for I had but one, I summoned the guard 
with their havildar (sergeant), and told them of the 

178 ' 



Life of Europeans in Kabul 

theft, but said I would wait until the morning, and 
if it was not found by that time I should report the 
matter to the Amir. Early the following morning 
one of the sepoys found the bridle lying in some 
long grass in the garden, and, as proof, showed me 
the spot where he had found it. I said that I;, had 
long suspected that there was a shaitan * (spirit or 
devil) about the house who was in the habit of 
mislaying articles belonging to me, and it was 
fortunate that I knew it, for otherwise I might 
think that the sepoys stole the things, and bring 
"budnami" (ill reputation) on them. They looked 
at me undecided whether I spoke sarcastically or 
meant it, but it was a long time before anything 
else was stolen from the house. 

The Kotwali guard with me gave a good deal of 
trouble through their thieving propensities. When I 
tried to fix the theft on them, for they never let 
themselves be caught red-handed, they would in turn 
accuse one or other of my servants, and by all com- 
bining their evidence, would show that one had seen 
the servant do it, and another one would bring the 
man he had sold the stolen article to, and so on, until 
they made up a strong case. That the servants stole 
things if left to themselves I knew, but I ha,d made a 
rule that each man was responsible for the articles in 
his charge, and had to make good anything lost, and 
this I enforced, so that a servant would not be likely 
to steal and sell that for which he had to pay double 
the amount he could sell it for. About this time, 

179 



Under the Absolute Amir 

when I was endeavouring to stop the thefts which 
just then were very frequent, a particularly bad lot 
of sepoys being on guard at the time, the Kotwal 
was evidently informed of my endeavours, for one of 
my servants was taken to prison accused of stealing 
two teapots from a tea- seller in the public garden 
close by, and some of the Kotwali sepoys with me 
gave evidence that they saw him sell the teapots to a 
shopkeeper in the bazar, and brought forward the 
shopkeeper and the teapots as evidence. The matter 
being taken before the Amir, the servant was ordered 
to be put in prison, and the Amir wrote to me to be 
careful what sort of men I got for servants, because, if 
a man was a thief, he might on occasion become a 
murderer, and it was dangerous for me to have such 
men about me. Having thus, as the Kotwal in- 
tended, prejudiced the Amir's mind against my 
servants, any complaint I was likely to make of his 
sepoys' stealing would not be listened to, when they 
would all swear that one of my own servants was 
guilty. Concerning the theft of teapots just men- 
tioned, I knew the servant to be guiltless, for both 
before the time of the supposed theft he happened to 
be with me for some hours, and after that until late 
at night, helping me while I made a bookshelf. 
Eventually I got the man released from prison, but 
he would not come back to my service, fearing, he 
said, the enmity of the sepoys. However, they 
followed their vindictive custom of not letting a man 
alone whom they had once accused, and got him back 

1 80 



Life of Europeans in Kabul 

in prison some short time after, where, like many 
another, he disappeared. 

The guards of sepoys given to the European 
servants of the Government are called guards of 
honour, but they have also to report all that the 
European does, where he goes, who visits his house, 
or his servants, and all pertaining to him. This is 
principally to find out if he is a spy, and sending 
reports to the Indian Government, but it also enables 
the Amir to find out what manner of man he is. 
The guard is a necessary one, to prevent Europeans 
being attacked by fanatics, or ghazis, as they are 
called, of whom there are plenty about, and from 
whom there is now more danger of attack than when 
the late Amir was in his prime. 

These fanatics care little, provided they kill a 
Feringhee, whether they themselves are killed the 
next moment or not, for they are then sure of 
Paradise, and the houri, and the rivers of milk, etc. 
I was attacked by one of them one afternoon in the 
workshops, while I was squatting on my heels, 
directing some masons below me, who were putting 
in the foundations of a furnace. The ghazi came 
behind with an empty 9-pounder iron shell in each 
hand, and threw one at me with all his force from 
close behind ; he aimed at my head, but fortunately 
I stood up at the moment he threw the shell, and 
received it between the shoulders instead of on the 
head, and the edge of the shell struck me about half 
an inch from the spine. The force of the blow took 

181 



Under the Absolute Amir 

all power from my body for a time, but the sepoy 
with me there was but one of the guards with me 
that day, strangely enough seized the man before he 
could throw the second shell, and pinioning his 
arms, got him on the ground, while the workmen 
gathered as if by magic, and kicked and beat the 
ghazi so roughly that he was soon in a semi-conscious 
condition. I afterwards sent for the captain of the 
regiment on guard in the workshops, and had the 
man made prisoner, and put in the guard-room there, 
pending the Amir's orders. He was punished by 
being kept for six months with his hands chained 
together with a stick between, so that they should 
remain about twelve inches apart, and the punish- 
ment included being kept in prison for life. To try 
and kill a Feringhee is not a very great crime among 
Mussulmans, and the man's friends very nearly 
succeeded in getting the sentence annulled a year or 
so later, but I used the influence I had, and their 
efforts were not successful. For some days after 
being attacked I was unable to move about much, 
and paralysis was feared, for the spine was injured a 
little ; but Mrs. Daly, the lady doctor, attended me 
with so much care and skill that I was soon going 
about as usual, though for a year or two the place 
was tender. The Amir sent his own hakeem (doctor), 
with many expressions of sympathy, to examine my 
hurt. He came for three days to inquire how I 
progressed, and then rejoined the Amir at Paghman, 
where he had moved his court, to escape the cholera, 

182 



Life of Europeans in Kabul 

which broke out the day I was injured. There were 
other attempts, but none where I escaped so narrowly, 
and these happened in the last three years of my 
stay in Kabul, that is, when the late Amir was feeble, 
and during the reign of the present Amir, who is not 
yet a prophet in his own country. 

One attempt, which illustrates the narrow-minded 
jealousy of the Kabuli, was in the powder-shop, where 
I went in accordance with instructions from the Amir 
to put matters in order, the Amir saying that the 
powder made in Kabul fouled the bore of the guns 
much more than foreign powders did. The man in 
charge of the powder-shop was a member of the royal 
family, which is a large one in numbers, and he 
resented my appointment over his head to the extent 
of putting flints with the powder 'in the incorporating 
mills and starting them as soon as I entered the shop 
they were in. There is always a possibility of powder 
exploding while incorporation is going on, and, 
seeing that he and all the others with him remained 
outside and left me to go alone into the shop, I 
suspected that all was not right, so, going out, I gave 
orders for the mills to be stopped, and then I found out 
the reason I was allowed to inspect them alone. I said 
nothing of this to the authorities, as my report which 
showed that the quantities of the ingredients were so 
arranged as to prove a source of revenue to those in 
charge, would, I knew, be sufficient for all purposes. 

Europeans are allowed to take their wives to 
Kabul, and the wives are generously given a living 

183 



Under the Absolute Amir 

allowance by the Amir; but Kabul is no place for 
a woman to live in, for there are no amusements, and 
there is practically no society for her, and few women 
can live happily who see no one but their husbands 
from one month to another ; consequently women are 
forced back on themselves, and get into a low con- 
dition of health, which soon brings out all the ail- 
ments they are subject to. For children the climate 
is a good one, and they thrive well. The Afghans 
are fond of children, and as they believe that all of 
them, no matter of what race, are Mussulmans until 
they arrive at the age of reason, European children 
are well looked after wherever they go, and are 
admired to the extent of a large crowd following 
them about the roads and public gardens when they 
take their daily outings. Toys are given them, and 
their every wish is a law, so that they are very much 
spoilt, and usually yell when they have to be taken 
from their guards and go into the house to their 
father and mother. The change from despot to 
subject being one little to their liking. 

European women servants are not desirable in 
Kabul, for they require looking after too much, and 
are, besides, of little use except as companions for 
their mistresses. They are treated familiarly by the 
native servants and others they come in contact with, 
and form acquaintances which are not to their credit. 
Those who were brought to Kabul in the early part 
of my stay there by the wives of the English residents 
were mostly sent away in more or less disgrace, while 

184 



Life of Europeans in Kabul 

the German nurse, who was taken up there by Mrs. 
Fleischer, left her when her services, for which she 
was engaged, were immediately required, and went to 
the present Amir's harem and placed herself in the 
hands of his chief wife, saying that she wanted to 
become a Mussulman, and although Mr. Fleischer 
went to the Amir's palace late that night to get the 
woman to return, if only for a day, or until the 
trouble was passed, the Amir said he could not use 
force to make her do so, but she could return for 
a time if she wished, and this the woman refused to 
do. Consequently Mrs. Daly had her hands very 
full looking after Mrs. Fleischer and the baby all 
that night and the next day unattended by any 
nurse. The German nurse eventually got a husband, 
which was apparently the chief reason of her apostasy, 
although at first it seemed likely to be a difficult 
matter, for when the Amir called together his 
attendants and asked who would marry her, her 
face had unfortunately been seen by them, and 
none volunteered. In this we see one advantage 
of the Afghan marriage custom. The Amir at last 
bestowed her on a Kafri officer, whose pay he raised, 
and a house was given them to live in. 

As there are no Christian churches or clergymen 
in Kabul, Mrs. Fleischer's baby was christened by 
her husband, Mrs. Daly and myself standing as 
sponsors, and the Amir, in a firman, giving the child 
its name. Any written order of the king is called a 
firman. 



Under the Absolute Amir 

The English who formerly lived in Kabul were 
not unfortunate in having their social status at home 
fixed. One lady, the wife of one of the English 
employes, on stating that her father was a minister, 
had the admission promptly translated by the native 
interpreter as " the daughter of the Prime Minister" 
and the other ladies had to keep up to this standard 
to prevent themselves being put down as nobodies ; 
consequently it was a rather well-connected bevy 
who graced the Queen-Sultana's court on occasions. 

l"he servants to be obtained in Kabul are unfit 
for anything but the commonest sort of housework, 
and know nothing of English cooking or waiting at 
table. I took a Hindustani cook and a khitmatgar 
(table- servant) up with me, and engaged Hazara 
coolies to carry water, sweep, and clean things, and 
to look after the horses. After several months' ser- 
vice these men got to know their work, but by the 
time they had done so and were becoming useful, 
they had invariably saved enough money to return 
to their own country and start as farmers in a small 
way. Some of the Hazaras I had from time to time 
who worked as cook's assistant, were soon able to 
cook several English dishes, and do it well, and, no 
doubt, if they could have been induced to stop long 
enough, they would have become good cooks. The 
Hazaras, however, are a truculent lot, and quarrels 
with the sepoys on guard were frequent. In conse- 
quence of this quarrelling there was a good deal 
of enmity generated, and several of my servants 

186 



Life of Europeans in Kabul 

disappeared, and I found out afterwards that they 
had been put in prison by the Kotwali sepoys on a 
charge of being spies, and supplying me with infor- 
mation, and while in prison were put out of the 
way by one or other of the methods of murder in 
common use there. 

One Hindustani servant who was with me on the 
journey up to Kabul through Kandahar, some months 
later developed into a drunkard, drinking the raw 
spirit which is distilled in the Government shops and 
sold to Hindoos in the bazars, as well as being used in 
different manufactures. I put up with it for a long 
time, but when I found that matters got worse daily, 
and not only the work was not properly done in the 
house, but a good deal of swindling was going on, I 
wrote to some friends in India, and had another man 
sent up to replace him. I had kept back part of his 
pay for some time to prevent him wasting it in drink 
and women, as he was fond of doing, and had given 
orders to the sepoys on the gate to stop him going 
out at night to other Hindustanis' houses where cards 
were played, drink supplied, and loose women were 
kept ; but all this failed to stop the man's mis- 
behaviour, and when the other servant at last arrived 
I obtained a passport to enable him to return to 
India, and told him to arrange by which caravan he 
would travel, and to see me the day before he started, 
when I would give him the wages I had kept in 
hand. In the mean time he went to live with some 
friends, and two or three weeks passed before he 



Under the Absolute Amir 

came to me one evening to say good-bye, and tell 
me that he was starting for India the next morning. 
I said good-bye to him, gave him his money and his 
road permit, and he went away. A short time after 
I found that he had not gone back to India, but had 
used the money to get married to a widow a rather 
notorious character and had been paying daily visits 
to my old enemy, the Kotwal, who tried to compro- 
mise me before the Amir through this man. He had 
told the Kotwal many lies to revenge himself on me ; 
but as nothing he said could be proved, the Amir 
refused to listen, whereupon the Kotwal clapped the 
man in prison as the best means of preventing his 
tongue wagging about his own part in the matter of 
getting up a case against me, and some few weeks 
later had his throat cut at night, and the body dis- 
posed of. Of the sequel I knew nothing for some 
months, but eventually a man told me the particulars 
related to him by a Kotwali sepoy, of how this sepoy 
had been one of those appointed to cut the servant's 
throat late one night, and how the body had been 
stripped of its clothing, and then thrown into a ditch 
and covered with earth. He said the man's screams 
were fearful when he saw they had come to kill him, 
and, knowing his timid nature, I can believe it. 

The Hindustani servants I had in Kabul all 
swindled more or less, and generally more toward 
the end of their service, when I was forced to dismiss 
them and get others. I had little time to attend 
to household affairs, except at night, and then I was, 

188 



Life of Europeans in Kabul 

as a rule, too tired to go into matters properly, and 
it is not at night that one can thoroughly see to 
such things, and I had perforce to accept their 
statements, such as the quantity of cattle and horse 
food bought and used, without knowing whether the 
animals had received all that was charged for, and 
being morally certain they had not ; so the servants, 
seeing the position, took advantage of it, as natives 
ever will. Thrashing servants does little good, and 
it besides engenders in them a spirit of retaliation, 
which shows itself in small things, such as forgetting 
trivial household duties, while pretending to do 
their utmost to please the sahib, and though these 
offences are so trivial, yet when one has other 
worries which are irritating they loom large, and 
are very trying to bear. In retaliation of this sort 
the natives are past masters, and mention of the 
small duty forgotten sends them into apparent fits 
of abject contrition. Both the servant and one's self 
know it is all humbug, but there is nothing of malice 
aforethought to be proved, so the servant retires 
gracefully with, when far enough off, a smug smile, 
while his master stands and fumes at his impotence 
to punish without losing dignity. Those who do not 
know the native, and he seems to be much the same 
in all Eastern countries, may think that they would 
find means of counter-retaliation, but rather than let 
matters go so far as that, it is better to get rid of 
the servant and try a new man, and this has its 
drawback, for one who changes servants frequently 

189 



Under the Absolute Amir 

will soon find it difficult to get a good one, and in 
native servants there are many degrees of quality. 
The general experience of Englishmen in the East 
seems to be much the same, except that some fare 
worse with their servants than others, and if those 
who do not understand the native were present on 
some occasions, it is extremely probable they would 
think the master most unpleasantly unjust to poor 
servants, who were doing their best for him. 

If one wants to buy cheaply from the bazar, it is 
better to send a native of the country to do the 
buying, rather than a Hindustani, for the latter, 
being known to be an Englishman's servant, is 
charged double the price asked from any one else. 
When a native of the country does the buying, he 
always adds something on to the price when render- 
ing the account, and so does a Hindustani, but 
generally the amount of the commission he charges 
is less than the other one, and one also saves the 
extra price asked by a shopkeeper from the 
Hindustani servant. I have tried sending the latest 
engaged, and therefore the poorest, Hazara servant 
to the bazar to buy things, and in his innocence the 
man has charged me the prices asked by the shop- 
keeper, who thought he was dealing with a poor 
Hazara, and from the prices so obtained, I was able 
to keep some sort of a check on the other servants, 
and prevent their commission becoming too excessive. 
This dustoori, or commission on things bought, is 
recognized as quite the right thing by all servants 

190 



Life of Europeans in Kabul 

when buying for a foreigner, and the poor Hazara, 
who charged me no more than what he paid, used to 
have a bad time from the other servants when they 
found out that he had made nothing for himself; 
but a few months' service and advice from, and the 
example of, other servants always corrected such 
stupidity. However, I always found the Hazaras more 
reasonable in their dostoori, and therefore cheaper 
to send to the bazar than Hindustani servants, for 
the latter were always grasping to the last degree, 
and generally managed to kill the goose with the 
golden eggs by their avaricious tendencies, and it 
was a great blow to their pocket, to say nothing of 
their dignity, when I would take the purchase of 
requirements from their hands and appoint some 
poor servant to do the work instead, much to the 
latter's importance and swagger before the others. 



191 



CHAPTER XII 

LIFE OF EUROPEANS IN KABUL Continued 

Lawlessness Food: raising cattle, sheep, fowls, etc. Presents from 
princes and others Famines in Kabul Cholera Moullah's pilgrim- 
age and preaching Use of roofs of houses Work and working 
hours Amusements Hindu dealers and old curios Festival visits 
to Amir and princes Europeans tried by jury Letters : cost of 
postage Interpreters. 

AFTER the death of Amir Abdur Eahman, a good 
deal of lawlessness prevailed in the bazars, which 
was principally due to soldiers interfering with most 
of the people they met, for the men of the army 
looked upon themselves, and not altogether without 
reason, as the cocks of the wall, since the Amir's 
death, and of course, did their best to show that they 
were not subject to any authority. I had, therefore, 
to send one of my guards with the servant, who went 
to the bazar daily to make purchases, to prevent the 
man being molested, and to ensure his returning with 
all the articles he had bought. 

Shopkeepers also took advantage of the un- 
settled nature of affairs to give short weight, and in 
other ways increase their profits, no doubt thinking 
it best to make all they could before the disturbances, 
which all expected, set in. One shopkeeper took 

192 



Life of Europeans in Kabul 

half the matches from each box in the packets of 
twelve, and sold them in this half-filled condition, 
in order to reap a double profit. One of these 
packets being sold to one of my servants, and the 
fraud detected, the soldier who accompanied the 
servant knocked two of the shopkeeper's teeth out, 
whereupon the shopkeeper made complaint to the 
Kotwal, who reported the case to the soldier's com- 
manding officer, and the affair ended in my being 
several rupees out of pocket in obtaining the soldier's 
acquittal. Bribery and corruption, of course ; but I 
could not let the man suffer for his over-zealous 
protection of my interests. He was a simple Afghan 
soldier, and such men are usually very straight- 
forward, and only think of carrying out the orders 
given them. I once sent a soldier of this description 
to tell one of the workshop foremen to come to my 
office, and on the foreman impudently sending back 
word to the effect that he was busy and would come 
later, I told the soldier to bring him by the beard if 
he did not come on being told to do so. The soldier 
went off, and presently returned dragging the man by 
the beard, the two together making sufficient noise 
on their progress to attract a crowd of workmen, who 
followed to see the end of the matter. Although I 
had not intended my instructions to be literally 
carried out, the effect on the rest of the workmen was 
that I had no occasion to send twice for another man. 
In the bazars it is not an easy matter to get 
good meat, the sheep killed for the supply of meat 

193 o 



Under the Absolute Amir 

being generally the large Turkestan! sort, the flesh of 
which is tough, and, being also rather flavourless, is poor 
eating. For this reason I bought my own, the small 
Hazara ones, which much resemble the Welsh sheep, 
and having got together a flock of fifty to sixty ewes, 
I sent them to Hazara, where pasturage is cheap and 
plentiful, and had others bred from them there. The 
young lambs were sent down to me from time to 
time in batches of eight or ten, to enable me to feed 
them up ready for killing, and in this way I got very 
good mutton, and each sheep killed cost less than a 
couple of shillings on an average, but I paid nothing 
for pasturage and no wages, the man in charge 
taking the sheep's milk, from which he made cheese, 
in lieu of pay. I also bred fowl, duck, geese, 
turkey, and guinea-fowl, and as food for them is 
cheap, they were inexpensive, and the fowl provided 
me with all the fresh eggs I wanted. I kept a couple 
of cows for milk, and the supply of occasional veal, 
when their calves grew up large enough to kill. The 
cows of the country seldom give a good supply of 
milk for long, so that I found it necessary to keep 
two to ensure a constant supply of milk sufficient for 
daily use, and for making butter. Flour used to be 
cheap, but the price for several years past has been 
going up steadily, so that it is now three times the 
price it was five years ago, and when I left Kabul, it 
was selling at six pounds per rupee (a little less than 
three half-pence per pound). 

Tea, coffee, tinned provisions, tobacco, wines, etc., 

194 



Life of Europeans in Kabul 

must be got up from India and usually it takes about 
three months from the time ordered before they are 
received. The reason it takes so long to get up 
provisions is due to the karaya-kash people (carriers 
for hire), first in the difficulty in persuading one of 
them to undertake to carry the goods from Peshawar 
to Kabul, and next in delaying the goods on the road 
for many weeks. It very frequently happens that a 
man carrying for hire gets a load in Peshawar for all 
his camels, horses, etc., part of the load being booked 
to Jelalabad, which is half way to Kabul, and the 
other part of the load to Kabul. On the man reach- 
ing Jelalabad he delivers the goods which are con- 
signed there, and leaving there those goods which are 
to go further on, he returns to Peshawar for another 
load, and he continues going backwards and forwards 
until the goods for Kabul are sufficient for all his 
animals and then he goes on to that place. As the 
journey to Jelalabad from Peshawar takes five or six 
days, the various trips to and fro until the man is 
ready to go on to Kabul, take time, and if one 
happens to be out of tobacco, or anything else one 
wants, this prolonged waiting for fresh supplies is 
very irritating, particularly when one has been 
advised by letter from Peshawar that the goods left 
there some weeks before, but when the goods at last 
arrive one is so pleased in getting them, that all 
former irritation is forgotten. It often happens 
that goods are spoilt or go bad on the road on 
account of the boxes being left in the serais (caravan 

195 



Under the Absolute Amir 

yards) at different places exposed to the weather, but 
there is no remedy, and one has to take one's chance. 

When the tribes about the Khyber Pass rose and 
necessitated the Tirah campaign, all traffic between 
Kabul and India was stopped, and we in Kabul had 
to go without those things which go to make life 
comfortable. There was nothing to drink, not even 
tea or coffee, and nothing to smoke, and so it con- 
tinued for some months. I can go without most 
things when necessary, and not grieve overmuch, 
although I would rather necessity did not demand 
such abstinence, but when there is no tobacco or 
cigarettes, then matters seem to be in need of speedy 
readjustment, and I shall always remember the time 
when the Khyber Pass was closed. The Amir and 
the princes were always very good in letting me 
have things I wanted when I ran short, but on that 
occasion they ran short themselves. 

The Amir and his sons were also very good in 
sending me occasional presents of game and fruit, the 
latter being sent them from other places before they 
were to be obtained in Kabul, and the strawberries 
they used to send me in the spring before the fruit 
in Kabul was ripe was a favour I very much appreci- 
ated. In the spring there was, as a rule, a scarcity of 
vegetables, the last year's supply being finished and 
the new year's not yet in, and I often had to go 
without potatoes for some weeks, and that is a dish 
I think most people would not care to be without at 
dinner ; however, when I became accustomed to the 

196 



Life of Europeans in Kabul 

place I made arrangements which obviated going 
short in that respect. 

During the famine of 1903, when so many thou- 
sands died of starvation, most of the bazar pro- 
visions were very scarce, and some things were not 
to be had at any price. Flour was unobtainable in 
the market, and I had to buy a supply of wheat 
for myself and the servants from the Government, 
and have it ground'. The Government opened a 
depot and sold a stipulated quantity every day to 
the people, as there was none to be had elsewhere, 
and it is the custom of the Government to keep 
full granaries in case of emergency. The struggles 
of the people to be first in getting to the depot, in 
order to obtain a share of the wheat before the 
daily quantity allowed for sale was disposed of, 
were so great, and the crush so dense, that many, 
principally women, were killed, by being knocked 
off their feet and trampled to death. The distress 
among the poorer classes was particularly great. 
Parents, who had sold all there was in the house 
that could be sold to get money for food, had to 
watch their children crying of hunger, and daily 
getting weaker and thinner until at last they died, 
while they themselves, if they lived, did so only 
because they had more vitality and were stronger, 
and not because they ate food themselves and gave 
none to their children. 

Most of the men under me in the workshops 
were starving, and sometimes a man would faint 

197 



Under the Absolute Amir 

while working, and on my asking what ailed him, 
I would gather that he had perhaps eaten about 
two ounces of bread in as many days. It was im- 
possible to help all, but those of my workmen, 
whom I knew to be helpless with hunger, I gave 
food to once a day, and in many cases it was all 
they got until the next day. I saw one man hiding 
some of the bread I had given him under his coat, 
and the man, being run down to skin and bone for 
want of food, I was surprised at his not eating it 
all, but he told me that he had a child at home 
starving, and there was nothing in the house to sell 
for food. He said, also, that the mother of the 
child, and other women in the house, had nothing 
to eat, but that appeared to be a matter of little 
concern, and it was the condition of the child only 
that worried him. No one puts much value on a 
woman in Kabul, and it is not considered right for 
a man to cry for the death of a woman, even 
when it is his mother or sister who dies, but they 
cry and make enough fuss over the death of any 
male relative. 

Another day a foreman workman came to me, 
and, without the usual salaams, told me he was a 
f Mussulman, and had seldom asked a favour of his 
co-religionists, and never of a Feringhee ; but he 
had three little children starving at home, and they 
were dying slowly, and his fellows would not give 
him anything, so he had determined to cut the 
throats of his children that night and put them 

198 



Life of Europeans in Kabul 

out of their suffering, and then kill himself, but 
while saying his midday prayers it had been put 
into his mind to go first to the Feringhee, and so 
he had come as soon as his prayers were finished. 
His manner of speech was not polite, and very 
much removed from that of others who begged for 
help from me, and who usually addressed me as 
"Presence;" but I knew the man to be one of the 
religious bigots who abound in the country, to 
whom an infidel is lower than an animal. How- 
ever, I gave him three rupees without remark of 
any kind, and the man, without thanking me, but 
simply looking dully at the money, went away. 
Three rupees go a long way in Kabul, although 
they amount to less than half a crown. I thought 
no more of the matter until two days after, when 
the man came again, and, taking off his turban, 
prayed for me ; this is the highest compliment and 
favour a Mussulman can pay an unbeliever. He 
then told me I had saved the life of his children, 
and his too, for he had been mad with grief and 
suffering when he first came, and he said further 
that he had been told much against Englishmen, 
but he would always pray now that one of them 
might become a Mussulman, and so go to heaven 
when he died. 

On top of the famine that year came cholera, 
and the mortality was very high, for the people 
were weak with want of food, and their systems 
out of order through eating any rubbish they could 

199 



Under the Absolute Amir 

get to keep off the cravings of hunger. Daily the 
roads leading to the burial grounds streamed with 
people carrying their dead, and many, I knew, who 
came to tell me of a mutual acquaintance whom 
they had taken for burial that day, were them- 
selves carried to the same place the next day, or 
a day later. The cholera spread among all classes, 
and penetrated even to the harems of the princes, 
Sirdar Nasrullah Khan's favourite wife dying of it, 
and among others the Amir's favourite slave boy 
was carried off. Several of the highest officials also 
got the disease, and died of it. 

The members of the royal family are particularly 
afraid of cholera, that and earthquakes being their 
chief dread; and during other outbreaks the late 
Amir and his family, with all their officials and 
attendants, posted off helter-skelter from the city to 
Paghman the moment cholera made its appearance. 
When the cholera epidemic of 1900 occurred, three 
years before the one mentioned above, the late Amir 
and all his people went off at once, and the carts 
carrying luggage, tents, etc., people on horseback 
galloping, carriages driving along furiously, and the 
servants and soldiers on foot also hurrying on, gave 
to the scene all the appearance of a disorderly flight. 
The English (Mrs. Daly and myself were the only 
Europeans there at the time) were left behind to get 
on as best we could, and she spent the next four 
months in the treatment of cholera cases, whereby 
she saved many lives, while I occupied myself with a 

200 




KABULI WOMAN'S INDOOR DRESS. 



[To face p. 200. 



Life of Europeans in Kabul 

series of experiments in smokeless powder-making, in 
which I was fortunately successful, chiefly because 
I was left all this time untroubled and alone. 

When the 1903 outbreak occurred, the present 
Amir, following his father's example, sent off furni- 
ture, carpets, etc., to Paghman at once, intending to 
follow them himself the next day ; but in the mean 
time the Governor of the city, hearing of his inten- 
tion, went to him and frankly told him that if he left 
the city, the prevailing dissatisfaction was so great 
that the soldiers and people would rise, and he would 
never be able to return to it. So the Amir, who 
accepted the Governor's view of the situation, had to 
remain in his palace in Arak, and here he confined 
himself to two rooms, and allowed only some half- 
dozen favourite courtiers and attendants to see him, 
but he would not allow those who saw him to leave 
the palace, for fear of bringing the infection back 
with them. Sirdar Nasrullah Khan, who was, of 
course, obliged to remain in his city palace since the 
Amir did not go away into the country, spent most 
of his time on his prayer-carpet, so I was told by 
those who were with him ; and when his favourite 
wife got cholera and died, he was described as being 
almost mad with grief at her loss and fear of the 
disease attacking him next. 

The prince's fear, as also that of the Amir, had a 
reason, however, which intensified their usual dread 
of the disease, and it came about in this way. One 
of the chief and most influential of the moullahs 

201 



Under the Absolute Amir 

in the country started on the Haj (holy pilgrimage to 
Mecca) in the beginning of that year, and while 
going down through India, on his way to the sea-port 
where he intended embarking for Medina, he heard 
of a holy man who preached the second coming of 
Christ one who said that he, like another St. John, 
had been sent on to prepare the way, and make 
Christ's coming known. The moullah went to see 
this man, of whom many and wonderful things were 
told by the natives about, and the words of the self- 
styled prophet were so convincing that the moullah 
was converted, and came to believe in the man being 
what he said he was. One day, it being known that 
the moullah was going on the Haj, the "prophet" 
took him into an inner room, and there, the moullah 
afterwards stated, the two together visited Mecca, 
and he saw himself one of the multitude of pilgrims 
at the holy shrine, and visited the inner court, and 
saw all there was to see, and said all the prayers 
prescribed in the different places before reaching the 
inner sanctuary. Whether mesmeric, or other in- 
fluence, would account for this hallucination of the 
moullah is a matter for conjecture, but even death 
could not shake the moullah's belief that he had been 
to Mecca, and that his guide was a true prophet. 
The Mohammedans believe that the religion preached 
by various prophets (Moses, Christ, Mahommed) are 
the true religions for the time being, and that God 
inspires a new religion as it becomes necessary to the 
advanced needs of mankind, and that, therefore, the 

202 



Life of Europeans in Kabul 

Jewish religion was the true religion until Christ 
came, and the religion Christ preached was the true 
religion until Mohammed came. This new man, 
therefore, if his preaching was listened to, would 
upset Mohammedanism, and as he preached that 
Mussulmans must regard Christians as brothers, and 
not as infidels, this would render useless the Amir's 
chief weapon, Jihad (religious war), in case of English 
or Russian aggression. So the Amir, when he heard 
of all this, sent word to the moullah to return, and 
the moullah did so, preaching the new religion as he 
came, and as soon as he was well within the 
boundaries of the country, he was made prisoner and 
brought to Kabul. Here he was examined by the 
Amir, but the Amir could find in the moullah's 
clever replies nothing against the true religion which 
would make him an infidel, and therefore worthy of 
death, for a Mussulman, according to the Koran, 
who becomes an apostate, must be stoned to death. 
He was then sent for examination to Sirdar Nasrullah 
Khan, who is regarded as more than a moullah in 
knowledge of his religion, but the prince could not 
convict the man out of his own mouth, and so a jury 
of twelve of the most learned moullahs was convened, 
and even their examination of the accused could 
elicit nothing on which the man might be killed, and 
they reported this to the Amir. But the Amir said 
the man must be convicted, and so he was again sent 
to the moullahs, who were told that they must sign a 
paper, saying the man was an apostate and worthy 

203 



Under the Absolute Amir 

of death. Again the majority of the moullahs made 
affirmation that he was innocent of anything against 
their religion, but two of the moullahs, who were 
friends of Sirdar Nasrullah Khan, and had been 
talked over by him, gave their verdict for death, and 
on the finding of these two moullahs the man was 
condemned by the Amir and stoned to death. 
Before being led away from the Amir's presence to be 
killed, the moullah prophesied that a great calamity 
would overtake the country, and that both the Amir 
and the Sirdar would suffer. About nine o'clock at 
night the day the moullah was killed, a great storm 
of wind suddenly rose and raged with violence for 
half an hour, and then stopped as suddenly as it 
came. Such a wind at night was altogether unusual, 
so the people said that this was the passing of the 
soul of the moullah. Then cholera came, and, accord- 
ing to former outbreaks, another visitation was not 
due for four years to come, and this was also regarded 
as part of the fulfilment of the moullah's prophecy, 
and hence the great fear of the Amir and the prince, 
who thought they saw in all this their own death, 
and it accounts also for the prince losing control of 
himself when his favourite wife died. The murdered 
moullah was a man with a large and powerful follow- 
ing, and the two moullahs who gave the verdict for 
his death lived in constant fear of the retaliation of 
his followers, who had sworn to avenge him. One 
of them got cholera, and almost died of it. 

During the summer months I used to put a tent 

204 



Life of Europeans in Kabul 

on the roof and sleep there. It was much fresher 
and cooler than in the house, for the nights in 
summer are hot, and there is little or no wind. As 
the roofs of the houses are flat and walled round they 
are generally used by the people for such purposes 
and to sit on in the evenings, and also the women 
use them for exercise and to get fresh air, as they are 
not allowed to go outside, and very few houses, and 
those only of the wealthy, have gardens attached to 
them which can be given for the sole use of women, 
because gardens to be of use to women must be 
walled round so high that they cannot be overlooked 
by neighbouring houses. It is also for this reason 
that houses are built in the form of a square with an 
inner courtyard where the women are free from the 
observation of neighbours ; but the courtyards are 
usually small and dirty, and the smell from rotten 
refuse thrown there makes them unfit for places of 
recreation. During the spring, on my return in the 
evening from the workshops or elsewhere for working 
hours are from early morning till evening I used to 
spend a good deal of time on the roof attending to 
seedlings which were planted in boxes and kept up 
there, where they had less chance of being uprooted, 
until they were ready for transplanting; and I put 
the seeds in at the earliest possible time so that 
I might get salads and other things without having 
to wait until they were in the market. On the roof, 
too, I sometimes amused myself, and any amusement 
was welcome, in flying different sorts of kites, and in 

205 



Under the Absolute Amir 

this I was soon imitated by those living near, but 
the house being close to the pass between the Sher 
Darwasa and Asman Heights I lost several of them 
through the sudden gusts of wind which sweep along 
the gorge there. 

For those who like such things Kabul affords 
a good field for the collection of old curios, swords, 
knives, shields, matchlocks, chain armour, etc., some 
of which are extremely ancient, and from the Arabic 
on many of the swords one might imagine them 
having been used against the Crusaders of old. Coins 
which date back to the time when Alexander the 
Great left his governors at different places on the 
route when he set out to conquer India can also be 
obtained, but a good knowledge of such is required, 
as they are counterfeited and sold there. Hindoos, 
of whom there are a few hundred resident in Kabul, 
usually have the stocks of curios, but they are afraid 
to bring them themselves to the Europeans because 
of the sepoys, who make them disgorge a good deal 
of their profits on leaving the house, and they cannot 
very well refuse to give anything when the sepoys 
threaten to make up a case against them, and report 
that they were carrying information to the Feringhee, 
as I have overheard them say. 

On great festivals it was usual for the Europeans 
to attend durbar to salaam the Amir and afterwards 
do the same to the princes. On these occasions the 
durbar wore a different aspect to what it did at other 
times, for now all present, including the Amir, were 

206 



Life of Europeans in Kabul 

merry and joking, and pleasantry was the order of 
the day. Some of the officials and others would be 
sitting on the floor playing chess, and the Amir would 
bet on one or the other of the players, and occasionally 
give advice as to the move to be made, for the Amir 
was a great chess player, and there were few in his 
court who could compete with him. The jester of 
the court would be in great form, and raise many 
a laugh with story and joke. It was on these 
occasions that the late Amir would mostly indulge in 
reminiscences of his career and talk of the places and 
men he had seen in Russia. One, who was a Russian 
merchant, the Amir always spoke of with feeling 
when relating the good turns this merchant had done 
him, for the merchant had on one occasion saved him 
from a good deal of embarrassment by a timely loan 
of money. The Amir once told me that he had 
worked for a watchmaker for some time in order to 
learn that trade, having little else to do to amuse 
himself, and he related various amusing stories of the 
clockmaker's wife, who seemed to have ruled her 
husband in a very strict manner ; but the Amir's 
conception of humour was too broad for the stories 
to bear repetition. 

The present Amir's court on days of festival lacks 
the noise and fun of his father's, for at all times he 
exacts the strictest order and decorum from those in 
his court, and he never unbends except to those of 
his relations with whom he is intimate, or unless 
there are but a few present. He was much more 

207 



Under the Absolute Amir 

approachable before he became Amir, but he was 
never fond of noisy merriment, and cared little for 
the rude jokes of the court jesters. He is fond of 
that which will amuse him in a quiet manner and 
help time to pass, and is always interested in the 
magic lantern he has, and when that is being worked 
he will look for hours at the different pictures projected 
on to the screen. 

Europeans in Kabul are not looked upon as 
amenable to the laws which govern the people there, 
but should they do anything which seriously violated 
any one of the laws which are common to all countries 
they would no doubt be deported to India, but so far 
no European resident has offended against any such 
law. The late Amir was chary of doing anything 
which another country could call in question, and 
once when an Afghan petitioned him to help him 
recover his dues from the Indian Government for 
supplies made to their army during the English 
occupation of 1879-81, the Amir thought the best 
way to do justice to the man, without committing 
himself to any decision, was to appoint six persons 
chosen from among the leading merchants in Kabul, 
together with myself, to go into the case, but the 
man's papers, which were in English, showed nothing 
but a full settlement of all dues. Another case in 
which I was appointed as one of the jury was that 
of a Continental merchant who came to Kabul to 
settle his affairs, who claimed the full amount of 
salary specified in the agreement, alleging that 

208 



Life of Europeans in Kabul 

although the amount of business clone was less than 
that agreed upon in the contract, which made the 
salary contingent upon a fixed amount of business 
done annually, he was not responsible for the falling 
off, for the business entrusted to him was less than 
agreed upon, and the annual salary stated in the 
agreement should therefore be paid him, as he had 
done the best he could, and had always been faithful 
to his contract and to the Government. Letters which 
he had written to one of the officials, and which had 
been stopped in the post and opened by the Amir's 
order, were, however, produced, which showed that 
he, in writing at least, thought little of the Amir's 
promises, and the letters also gave his opinion of the 
Amir in a rather bald manner. The Amir therefore 
contended that, on the face of those letters, he could 
not entrust business to a man who doubted his 
promises and had a far from exalted opinion of 
himself, and so my presence, together with Mrs. 
Daly's, was considered necessary on the jury, more to 
shame the merchant before other Europeans than 
anything else. I must, however, say that the letters 
showed that the merchant had thoroughly grasped the 
character of the Amir's officials. 

In the matter of letters, it used to be a very 
common thing for letters to the English in Kabul to 
be stopped and read by the appointed Government 
spies, and generally, after being read, they were not 
sent on an Englishman's private letter being a 
trivial matter in the eyes of the officials concerned. 

209 p 



Under the Absolute Amir 

Opening letters to and from the English in Kabul 
was, of course, to find out if there was any spying 
or reporting going on between them and the Indian 
Government, but in the present Amir's time this was 
stopped a good deal, and more of the letters sent 
to and from reached their destination safely. Post 
letters, however, are never looked upon as very 
sacred among the Afghans, and before all post letters 
were enclosed in a bag and sealed, with a list of the 
letters enclosed, and orders had been given to the 
postmasters that the letters of one post were not to 
exceed a certain weight, the postrunners used to open 
the parcel of letters and throw many down the 
mountain-side, in order to lighten the burden they 
carried. 

I was told of a case which concerned an important 
letter. It was from the British Agent to his Govern- 
ment, and the Amir wanted it, so orders were given 
and the post-carrier at a certain place on the road 
was killed, and all the letters he was carrying were 
taken back to Kabul. The murder and theft was 
blamed upon the tribes of the district where the 
crime was committed, and this seems to show that 
neither letters nor life are held sacred. However, 
the Amir got the letter he wanted, and nothing was 
said that could reflect upon his integrity. 

Letters are carried by men on five-mile relays, 
laid between Kabul and Peshawar ; each man 
running (not walking) backwards and forwards over 
his own five miles, carrying outward letters one way 

210 



Life of Europeans in Kabul 

and in-coming letters the other. In this way letters 
are carried between the two places in three days. 
The postage is fourpence per miskal, which is about 
one-sixth of an ounce, and stamps have to be affixed 
to the letters ; but the outgoing letters have the 
stamps taken off them by the Amir's postmaster in 
Peshawar before being put in the Indian post. 
Afghanistan is not in the postal union, and, therefore, 
letters to Kabul must have the postage paid on them 
in Peshawar or else be paid by the addressee. 

When magazines and periodicals are sent to Kabul 
the postage on them is a large item, and I once 
noticed that the postage I paid on a small magazine 
between Peshawar and Kabul (some two hundred 
miles) was three rupees, while the postage on the 
same from England to Peshawar was a penny. 
Letters sent from Kabul to India have to be ad- 
dressed in Persian, and Indian stamps must be put 
on the envelopes besides paying the postage in 
Afghanistan. 

One person in Kabul with whom English people 
are greatly brought in contact is the interpreter. 
There are several interpreters, but only one who is 
appointed to interpret between the Amir and the 
English residents, and this post is one which involves 
a good deal of work, for the man, in addition to 
interpreting whenever the Amir or the princes require 
his services, has to translate all letters from the 
English to the Amir, and vice versa. The Govern- 
ment correspondence with other countries is translated 

21 I 



Under the Absolute Amir 

by others, who are specially appointed for the post, 
and they are not encouraged to mix with the English 
people in Kabul. To be an interpreter a man must 
be quick at catching all inflections of meaning in the 
two languages, and must be ever ready to put in a 
word of his own in case he fails to hear something 
which is said on either side, for the Amir is impatient 
of having anything repeated. He must also be, in 
a measure, conversant with the subject under dis- 
cussion, as otherwise technical words would bring 
him to a standstill, and very often such English 
words require several sentences of Persian to explain 
them, as they have no equivalents except those 
adopted from other languages of late years. But 
particularly must he be able to interpret all that is 
said quickly and without mistake, otherwise he will 
be put aside and another man taken on in his place, 
and to him this means disgrace for always. 



212 



CHAPTER XIII 

SOLDIERS AND ARMS 

Clothing Reviews Drill Uniforms of Amir's bodyguard Arms Pay 
Medals Length of service Substitutes Barracks Mode of life 
Gambling among soldiers Different tribes forming regiments Thief 
tribe and regiment Officers and promotion Bands Afghan anec- 
dotes of incidents during war 1879-81 Afghan Army as a fighting 
machine Condition of country for warfare Illustration of one side 
of Afghan character. 

THE first thing that strikes one on seeing a regiment 
of Afghan soldiers is their irregular, slovenly appear- 
ance and slouching gait. Their clothes, for they 
have no uniforms for regular use, are of any sort and 
pattern as the wearer may desire or his purse can 
afford. Some have old English army or railway 
coats ; others have coats of various colours and 
materials which have been made in the bazar ; and 
coats made by the bazar tailors fit where they touch. 
Some have cloth trousers, some cotton ones, and 
some the Afghan tom-bons. Many wear the Afghan 
tom-bons with the shirt outside, as is usual in 
Eastern countries, and a sheepskin jacket, and this 
is the dress more generally worn, particularly among 
those regiments which are composed of hillmen. All 
of them, of course, have leather belts with pouches on 
either side, for neither soldiers nor civilians consider 

213 



Under the Absolute Amir 

themselves dressed without them, and an Afghan 
soldier or civilian who was seen without a belt would 
certainly look undressed to any one who had been 
some time in the country. For headgear the turban 
is commonly worn ; but there are different varieties 
of caps and hats, of which one that is liked by many 
is similar to the Eussian military peaked cap. 
Cavalry soldiers, or sowars as they are called, wear 
long boots of the Russian pattern, with very high 
heels, which give the wearers a curious perched-up 
appearance ; and these boots are much bepatched and 
mended. As I do not remember seeing a sowar with 
new boots on at any time, I fancy they must all be 
bought secondhand. The clothes the soldiers wear 
are generally old and much worn, but I have at 
times seen a havildar (sergeant) with a new coat, and 
as the man has to save up for many days before he 
can afford one, he pays great care in the selection of 
the cloth, and usually gets it of a vivid colour, light 
yellow or blue for preference, which soon looks the 
worse for wear, and necessitates the man spending 
many a half-hour when off duty in cleaning it. His 
old coat he sells to one of the men of his company. 

When a regiment is drawn up in line the rifles 
are held at all angles, for the men are not drilled as 
drilling is understood in other countries, and on the 
march a regiment looks like an armed mob rather 
than soldiers. In order to obtain a good appearance 
during the two annual reviews, the regiments are 
marched on to the review ground, and the officers 

214 



Soldiers and Arms 

then move the men singly into their proper places, 
pulling one man forward here and pushing another 
back there, until they form a double line of some- 
what varying straightness, and when the review is 
finished (the review consists of the Amir, or the 
prince as his deputy, riding past the different regi- 
ments), the men are again pushed into place to form 
fours, and are then marched off, all keeping their own 
step, back to the barracks, and on the road one man 
or another joins the four in front or behind in order 
to speak to a comrade, so that the little formation 
they had is soon upset, and the regiment goes along 
as it likes best, and that is anyhow. The men, after 
review or parade, which latter is the same as the 
review, except that one regiment only is placed in 
line and inspected by its officers, seem to consider 
that they have taken part in manoeuvres of consider- 
able intricacy, and appear to be rather proud of 
themselves. The men of the Amir's bodyguard, 
however, are drilled. The drill consists in the men, 
having already been taught to form themselves into 
fours, marching slowly in time to a drum-beat, and 
swinging each leg in turn high up in the air in front 
of them before bringing the foot down. This drill, 
which takes place on the main road outside the Arak 
palace, is witnessed by a large number of admiring 
citizens, but the spectacle of a regiment solemnly 
swinging their legs well up as they march, taking 
four or five seconds to each step, reminds one of a 
batch of recruits doing the goose-step. 

215 



Under the Absolute Amir 

Eegiments are occasionally drawn up on parade 
and fire volleys of blank cartridges ; but there are no 
rifle ranges at which the men are trained to shoot. 
Some batteries of artillery occasionally have target 
practice : but this is more to test guns than actual 
training. Those artillerymen whom I have seen at 
practice were very erratic in their shooting, and were 
seldom nearer than fifty yards of the object fired at, 
and when their general sighted a gun himself and 
got the target at two thousand yards, he was so 
pleased that he had to walk up and down for a few 
minutes. The reason men are not trained in shoot- 
ing is, I think, because in Afghanistan among all 
classes of men a cartridge is looked upon as a cart- 
tridge, and not a thing to be used without necessity. 
The only good shots I have seen are the workmen 
who test all rifles and guns as they are turned out of 
the shops. I have sometimes, when practising, given 
the small rifle I was using to one or other of the 
soldiers with me to try a shot, and in no case was 
any man at all near the target. The hillmen who 
are more accustomed to shooting and are sometimes 
good shots, lie down and rest the rifle on a rock when 
firing. 

The Amir's bodyguard, foot and cavalry, are 
the only regiments properly uniformed, and the 
Amir sees that they keep their uniforms clean, and 
their arms too. The foot-guards are armed with Lee- 
Metford rifles and bayonets, and the horse- guards 
with revolvers, swords, and carbines. Of the other 

216 



Soldiers and Arms 

troops, a few regiments of the most trusted men 
are armed with Martinis, and the rest have Sniders. 
The artillery batteries have six and nine pounder 
guns, and there are some mule batteries with six 
and three pounders, but the guns are badly sighted 
and of short range, the fuzes also are unreliable, and 
the shells of small efficiency, so that the artillery 
cannot be considered very formidable. The mules 
and horses used for the artillery and transport are 
strong and sturdy, and are used to mountain paths 
and roads, but the transport animals are too few 
for the service of a large army. The rifles, which 
are made in the Government shops, are also badly 
sighted, and hardly two of them shoot alike. If 
they are used for firing against a large number 
of men massed together, the defective sighting may 
not make a great deal of difference ; but accuracy 
is of first importance in a rifle, and the shooting 
of trained troops in action is sufficiently bad, without 
leaving much else to chance. Another great defect 
is that the powder, which is made in the country, 
fouls the bore after four or five rounds so badly 
that cleaning is necessary, for 'otherwise the kick 
of the gun prevents straight shooting, and tends 
to demoralize the shooter. Maxim and Gatling 
guns are also made in the shops, but owing to the 
inaccurate fitting of working parts, and the cart- 
ridges not being uniform and exact to gauge, it 
is seldom that a full belt of cartridges can be fired 
without a stop. 

217 



Under the Absolute Amir 

The pay of the troops is very inadequate, con- 
sidering the dearness of food now to what it used 
to be. For infantry the pay was eight rupees 
Kabuli a month, until the present Amir, on his 
coming to the throne, raised it, to keep the troops 
contented, to ten rupees a month (65. Sd.). Cavalry 
receive thirty rupees Kabuli a month (205.), but 
have to find their own horse and its keep out of 
that. The Amir's foot- guards receive thirty rupees 
a month, and are men envied by the rest of the 
troops because of their princely incomes. The 
soldiers were far from content when the Amir 
advanced their pay by two rupees only, for they 
expected more, and talked of what they would 
do if they did not get it; but the Afghans are very 
much like sheep, and unless there is one to lead 
the way, they remain where they are, and do nothing 
but bleat occasionally. For each active service medal 
a soldier gets a rupee extra monthly, and a soldier 
therefore prizes his medals ; but the loyalty medal 
given to all the troops by the present Amir, when 
after two years they had remained faithful to him, 
and had given no trouble, was in many cases pawned 
for the value of its silver in order to buy food, 
for the famine came on shortly after the medals 
were distributed. During the famine, when flour 
was unobtainable, the Government gave wheat in 
lieu of a certain portion of the soldiers' pay, and 
continued to do so until supplies from the new 
crops came in. 

218 



Soldiers and Arms 

The length of a soldier's service is indefinite, and 
may be regarded as continuing until he is too old for 
his duties. Many of the soldiers have told me that 
they had not seen their families for over twenty 
years, for there are no recognized regulations regard- 
ing leave, and when it is absolutely necessary for a 
soldier to go to his home to settle some private 
affairs, he is allowed to do so provided he leaves a 
substitute behind him. In some cases the substitutes 
are quite young boys, and I have seen several of 
them in the Jidrani and other regiments of hillmen 
who were so small that the rifle they carried seemed 
huge in comparison ; but usually they were smart in 
carrying out their duties, and were quick in attend- 
ing to orders. What their value would be on active 
service is another matter. The soldiers are mostly 
poor men, and some of them have nothing but their 
pay for themselves and family to depend upon, so 
when they find that they are growing old and their 
beards and hair getting grey, they dye them, in 
order to continue on the active list and go on 
drawing pay. 

The barracks of the soldiers are unfurnished, that 
is, they have no beds, chairs, or tables, and the men 
sleep on the floor, excepting those who are fortunate 
enough to possess a charpai, or wooden bedstead, and 
for a dining-table they spread a coarse mat on the 
ground and sit on it while eating their food. Each 
paira (guard of seven men, including the havildar) 
carries its own cooking utensils, and it is the havildar's 

219 



Under the Absolute Amir 

duty to provide a chopper for cutting firewood and 
an iron plate on which to bake bread ; the other 
utensils, which consist of a copper cooking-pot, a 
metal teapot, which is also used as a kettle, and 
handleless teacups, are provided by the men. As it 
is their custom to eat with their fingers direct from 
the pot, no knives and forks or plates are required. 

When off duty they laze about in groups, or sit 
and listen while one of their number strums the 
rubard and sings, or else they tell stories. Many 
of the soldiers are inveterate gamblers, and although 
card-playing is strictly forbidden and severely punished 
when detected, it is very common among them, and 
leads to a good deal of crime, and I knew one man 
who shot himself because of his losses at cards. If 
their quarters are near a bazar, they stroll about there, 
and very often make themselves objectionable to the 
people, and generally show off as soldiers will when 
they have nothing better to do. The soldiers, how- 
ever, do not have a great deal of time to themselves, 
for there are many guards which they have to mount 
and other duties on which they are kept busy. Their 
duties on guard are not tiring, and they do little but 
sit and sleep, except when they have to take their 
turn at sentry-go. They have passwords for the 
night, and the word is changed every second or third 
night. With those on guard round the Amir the 
password is different each night, and is strictly 
enforced. 

The various regiments are usually named after 
220 



Soldiers and Arms 

the tribe or country they come from, such as the 
Mohmunclai, Jidrani, Jarji, Kandahari, Kohistani, 
Ardeel, 'Oud Khel. Then there are the sappers and 
miners, which regiment is entirely composed of 
Hazaras, and the artillery, which is called the toop 
knana. All the men of the army are Afghans, ex- 
cepting the sappers and miners and the Kotwali 
(police) regiment, the latter being derisively styled 
by other regiments as " panch padar " (men with five 
fathers). The Amir's horse-guards are called the 
" Rissala Shahi." 

The 'Oud Khels are the thief tribe, and as it was 
impossible to stop their depredations by other means, 
for the chiefs of the tribe said their land was unpro- 
ductive and they had no other means of living, the 
late Amir formed the bulk of them into a regiment, 
and gave the rest of the tribe to understand that 
they must stop stealing from their fellow-countrymen, 
telling them that if they wanted to steal they must 
go to India to do it. Many of the rifles stolen from 
Peshawur and other Indian cantonments could be 
accounted for by these people. The 'Oud Khels used 
to give the former Amirs of the country a good deal 
of trouble, and they resisted the various feeble 
attempts made at different times to keep them in 
order ; but Amir Abdur Eahman was too strong for 
them, as he was for most of the lawless people of the 
country. 

There is a story told by the people of Kabul of 
Amir Shere AH and the chief of the 'Oud Khels. 

221 



Under the Absolute Amir 

The latter had been sent for to be told that unless the 
tribe stopped their thieving, which had of late been 
very flagrant, the Amir would have each robber 
caught and hanged. The chief told him that no one 
could catch an 'Oud Khel in the exercise of his pro- 
fession, for they were all past masters, and in proof 
of what he said he undertook to rob the sleeping 
shawl from under the Amir himself that night, and 
consented to being hanged if he was caught while 
doing so. The next morning the chief appeared 
before the Amir and produced the sleeping shawl 
from under his coat, handed it to him, saying that he 
had redeemed his word. The Amir was astounded 
that the man could pass his guards, make his way 
undetected into his sleeping chamber, and there take 
from under him the shawl he slept on, without 
waking him ; and from that time, it was said, Amir 
Shere Ali left the 'Oud Khels alone. 

The 'Oud Khel regiment used to take their turn 
of guard in the workshops, each regiment in turn 
supplies a company for a month on this duty, and 
their captain I found to be a simple-minded man, 
and having helped some of his men during the first 
cholera epidemic that occurred while I was there, we 
became acquainted. He used to come to my office 
at times during the dinner-hour and chat with me, 
and one day I asked him to teach me the Pushtoo 
language, as I wished to learn it and had no book 
to study it from. He seemed uncomfortable when I 
asked him and remained silent, but after a time he 

222 



Soldiers and Arms 

said he could not teach languages, because he was not 
accustomed to it, but he would teach me to thieve, 
and he undertook to make me so efficient that in a 
few weeks no one would be able to catch me doing it. 
The 'Oud Khel regiment was disbanded by the Amir 
at one time, but they at once took to their old pro- 
fession, and complaints were so loud that the Amir 
had them enrolled again. 

The titles of the officers of the army are, Super 
Salah or Commander-in- Chief, Naib Salah, his deputy, 
Jinrael (general), Kernael (colonel), Kameedand (com- 
mandant), Kaftan (captain), Subadar (lieutenant of 
foot), Kisaldar (lieutenant of horse), Havildar (ser- 
geant of foot), Duffedar (sergeant of horse). The 
chief officers of the army are selected from the Amir's 
family, or from among his favourites, and there is no 
promotion by grades, but only by favouritism. The 
late Amir, when forming a regiment, would have the 
men drawn up in front of him, and then, by simply 
judging the character of those he thought suitable, 
would select from among them those who were to be 
the officers. 

There are several bands, some with string and 
some with wind instruments, and the music the brass 
bands bring forth is something to be remembered, 
for all the instruments seem to keep their own time, 
and each man apparently plays a tune of his own, 
and does his best to make what he plays over heard 
above the others. The result is rather staggering 
when they are close to one. There is a bagpipe band, 

223 



Under the Absolute Amir 

too, and snatches of their music would make it 
appear that they try to play Scotch airs ; and the 
men of this band imitate the Highland dress, the 
skirt being represented by a check print shirt, which 
hangs below the tunic and outside the trousers, 
which latter are often dirty white calico ones. This 
band is a tribute to the fighting qualities of the 
Highlanders, whom the Afghans look upon as 
superior to all others, and say they are real 
devils. 

I was told by one man that during the fighting 
on the Sher Darwaza heights by the city of Kabul, 
one day the English had to retire, and he saw among 
the last to go one of the Highlanders running 
leisurely back carrying his rifle under his arm, with 
the muzzle pointing behind, and, as he ran, slipping 
cartridges into the breach, and firing back at the 
enemy. The man said he could see that the High- 
lander's heart was not in his running away. On 
this day's fighting many of the citizens turned out 
to take part in it, and the man who told me the 
foregoing was one of them. 

The Afghans appear to judge music by the 
volume of sound created, for on one of the festivals, 
when I went with some others to salaam the Queen- 
Sultana, we were entertained in an open pavilion in 
the garden, and three bands were sent to play to 
us. They did so, stationing themselves on three 
sides of the pavilion and loudly playing different 
things at once, and it was rather trying, for they 

224 



Soldiers and Arms 

don't get tired soon, but the people round about 
seemed to think it quite all right. 

The Afghan Army, regarded as a fighting 
machine matched against civilized troops, could not 
be considered efficient. The Afghan, as a soldier, 
has many good qualities ; he can live for days on 
a few handfuls of grain, and endure considerable 
fatigue at the same time ; he can sleep in the open 
on the coldest night, wrapped in his sheepskin, and 
do no more than he is accustomed to ; over mountains 
he is untiring ; and he is plucky and would fight 
well, provided he had confidence in his officers. He 
also appreciates pluck, and Lieutenant Hamilton, 
who was with Cavagnari, and was one of those 
massacred, is to this day spoken of as the brave 
Feringhee. His own officers, however, are no better 
than himself in their knowledge of the art of war, 
and being chosen mostly from among the men, they 
have little authority as officers, and the influence of 
those who are looked up to by the men is entirely 
due to their own individuality. There is very little 
discipline, and unless an officer exerts his personality 
to make the men carry out his orders, he will find 
that they take very little notice of them, or him ; for 
the soldiers are quick to judge who is their master, 
and leniency or consideration is looked upon by them 
as one of two things fear of themselves, or the act 
of a fool. 

None of the generals have any knowledge of 
modern warfare, for their experience has been 

225 Q 



Under the Absolute Amir 

confined to the wild tribes of those countries brought 
under the rule of the Afghans of late years, and of 
those who fought against the English during the 
last war there are few, if any, living. When they 
talk of fighting any foreign power, they rely on the 
number of soldiers and hillmen that the preaching 
of the Jihad will influence to fight for their country ; 
and another thing they look upon as advantageous 
to themselves is that the country is so broken 
up and mountainous, it would offer considerable 
difficulty to the effective and rapid movement of 
invading troops, and it is this which forms one of the 
Amir's chief objections to the introduction of railways 
in his country. The Afghans rarely care to risk a 
pitched battle, and are besides more accustomed to 
guerilla warfare, and in the event of invasion it is 
the latter method of fighting which would, no doubt, 
be adopted, and among the mountain passes there 
are places where a few determined men, properly 
armed, could keep back an army. For an invading 
army there would be great difficulty in getting 
heavy artillery moved about in most parts of the 
country, and mule batteries would be required ; 
but in the plains around Kabul, Jelalabad, and 
Kandahar, big guns would be wanted, at least 
equal in range to the Afghan guns, and to get 
these to the Kabul plains, except by two round- 
about routes, would be very difficult. 

The Afghan authorities have now more con- 
fidence in the efficiency of their army, and consider 

226 



Soldiers and Arms 

it quite different and superior to what it was when 
Lord Koberts was there, and it is possible, in the 
event of another war with them, that they would 
offer battle in force, but if the day went against 
them, the rest of the fighting would probably be of 
the guerilla sort, to which they are more accustomed, 
unless they considerably outnumbered the enemy at 
any time. In their own fighting, one against the 
other, there is generally one pitched battle, and who- 
soever is routed runs away and fights no more ; they 
say themselves, that a defeated army runs, and does 
not stop running, under three days. 

In time of war women carry supplies to the men, 
and then the laws of " purdah " are suspended, and 
being a case of necessity, they are allowed to show 
their faces without shame. It is well known that the 
women, during the wars with the English, used to go 
out at night after a battle, and mutilate the bodies 
of the dead, and kill the wounded and dying. Many 
also took part in the fighting. As an illustration of 
one side of the Afghan character, I may mention an 
incident told me by a man, who belonged to the 
Kandahar district. His cousin owned a house some 
miles out of Kandahar (I have mentioned that houses 
are protected by high walls), and after one of the 
battles fought by the English against the tribes about, 
there were many stragglers following the main army 
back towards Kandahar. One day his cousin was 
told by one of his men that an Englishman was out- 
side the walls shouting, and on going to the roof, 

227 



Under the Absolute Amir 

whence he could look over the wall, he saw a 
Highlander carrying a rifle, who called out to give 
him some food. The cousin ran back to his room, 
and brought out a rifle, and climbing up to the roof 
again, knelt behind the wall, and aiming carefully at 
the soldier, fired. The man dropped, but was not 
killed, as a movement could now and then be 
observed, and the cousin feared to go out to get the 
rifle, for which he had shot him ; so they kept watch 
for two days before it was decided that life must be 
extinct, and during that time the soldier called often 
and piteously for water, but no one went near, 
fearing vengeance as long as there was life left 
in him. 



228 



CHAPTER XIV 

TEADES AND COMMERCE 

Amir's interest in mechanical tools, guns, etc. Workshops Consumption 
of fuel Ustads and workmen Pay of men Trades, shopkeepers, 
and merchants Produce of country Exports and imports Irriga- 
tion of crops and fights about water Caravans and methods of 
carrying freight Weights and measures Mirzas and offices Debt 
collecting Hindoos and Hindoo money-lenders Mint and coinage 
of country. 

AMIR ABDUR EAHMAN was greatly interested in all 
mechanical work, and his interest extended to trade, 
and the merchants carrying it on. The status of a 
merchant, in his opinion, was equal to that of any of 
his Government officials, and any complaint or 
representation a merchant might make to him was sure 
of a hearing. When he started his workshops, his 
avowed intention in doing so was not only to be able 
to turn out guns and rifles, but to educate his people. 
He said he wanted to teach them the trades of other 
countries, in order that they might raise them- 
selves to a level with the people of other nations, 
whereby they would not only make themselves and 
their country as prosperous as others were, but also 
by having an interest in work, would lose their habits 
of idleness, which caused them to drift into lawless- 
ness and wrong- doing. He afterwards complained 

229 



Under the Absolute Amir 

many times that, in spite of all he had done for 
them, his people were still the same, and that 
although he had killed so many thousands, the lesson 
failed to have the effect he desired on the rest of his 
subjects. 

His son, the present Amir, also takes the keenest 
interest io all things mechanical, and having been, 
from the time he was a boy, the chief officer of the 
Government workshops, visiting them once a week, 
and inspecting each department and all that was 
turned out, his knowledge of machinery is greater 
than that possessed by his father. There are some 
matters, however, that the Amir and the officials 
connected with the workshops cannot properly grasp, 
and occasions them a good deal of thought and 
perplexity. For instance, they cannot quite under- 
stand that it requires a given quantity of heat to 
generate a given quantity of steam, and as they burn 
a large amount of wood daily in the boilers (they 
have no coal), they are ever trying to reduce this 
quantity, without lessening the work of the engines. 
Once they thought they had solved the question, 
by using larger and thicker pieces of wood for the 
boilers, because these burnt more slowly than small 
pieces, and then when these huge lumps of wood 
failed to keep up the head of steam, and the engines 
ran slower and slower, they suspected the firemen 
of being the cause of it, and so had several of them 
thrashed. 

Another time the stock of firewood for the boilers 
230 



Trades and Commerce 

ran out, and a supply of freshly cut wood was brought 
in daily, for use until further large supplies could be 
arranged for, and stocked to dry. The wood being 
wet, it naturally burned slowly, and the steam could 
not be kept up, and although the daily consumption 
of wood remained the same, the engines worked 
worse than ever. They tried many things to alter 
this state of affairs, and looked in all directions but 
the right one to find the cause of the engines not 
working well, even opening out the cylinders to see 
if the pistons were right, and when all their investiga- 
tions failed to locate the cause of the trouble, the 
firemen were thrashed again. The firemen were once 
convicted of falsifying the quantity of wood burnt 
daily, making out that a larger quantity was used 
than was correct, and selling the balance, and after 
that they were ever suspected of doing their work 
badly or trying to spoil things for revenge. This 
was principally the reason that, whenever one of the 
officials got a bright idea for reducing the quantity 
of wood burnt daily, the firemen were invariably 
accused of spoiling the experiment, and as often as 
not were punished on suspicion. The life of a man 
who works on that which is little understood by 
those over him is not all roses. 

Although I was nominally in charge of the boilers 
and engines, with all sorts of other work, I was not 
responsible for the quantities of materials used, that 
being in the hands of another official, and the 
inherent suspicious nature of the Afghan, together 

231 



Under the Absolute Amir 

with his ignorance of work, makes him chary of 
accepting advice on such matters, so that, although 
I was consulted, my opinion, which exonerated the 
firemen, was looked upon as prejudiced, and my 
proposal to cut the wood into small pieces was 
regarded as a desire to waste Government property. 
Soon after my appointment as engineer to the Govern- 
ment, I had received another firman (Amir's written 
order) which placed the engines and boilers in my 
charge in addition to the work for which I had been 
engaged, and I was told to thoroughly examine them, 
as the engines worked very badly, and to report if it 
was the fault of the engines, boilers, or the firemen. 
No firman is given without all people whom it 
concerns knowing it very soon after, and when I 
went to the boiler-house the next day, I found the 
men there very gloomy, and they probably thought 
that, as they who were on the work always and had 
done their best to keep steam up on the limit of 
firewood had failed, there was little chance of my 
doing better, and then, no doubt, I would put the 
blame on them, according to the method of their own 
people, who always blame the men under them when 
they are unable to right matters. My examination 
of the boilers showed that they were encrusted with 
a thick deposit of lime and mud, for no attempt had 
been made to clean them out since they were first 
started, so the men told me, and it took about two 
weeks to put matters right. After this the firemen 
always referred to me as an authority when blamed 

232 



Trades and Commerce 

for their work, and it was considered that I had 
found out their swindling and had promised not to 
report them if they carried on the work properly in 
future. In many other things I found that it was 
thought I favoured the workmen, and shielded them 
from punishment because I pitied them, for I let it 
be known very clearly that I considered the pay of 
most of the men inadequate, and though I was able 
to have the wages of many of the men increased as 
opportunity offered, it was done more as a favour to 
me than anything else, and other workmen remained 
at the same rate of pay on which they started work. 

Another idea they had was that of bringing 
water to a higher level by means of syphons, and 
one day, when I was in durbar with the late Amir, 
he held forth on this subject to some chiefs who 
who had come to see him from a distant part of the 
country, explaining to them, that if you take an 
inverted syphon, and pour water down one of its legs, 
the water rises up out of the other one ; it did not 
rise up far above the level of the second opening, he 
said, but he intended using a series of them to 
bring water in this way to a dry stretch of land 
near Kabul, which stood above the level of the neigh- 
bouring streams, and he turned and asked me, if what 
he said was not correct. I gave no answer, as an 
affirmative would involve me in the carrying out of 
the work, and to say otherwise would not be polite 
in public durbar, when it was the Amir who spoke. 
Some time afterwards the principal ustads (foremen) 

233 



Under the Absolute Amir 

of the workshops were sent for by the Amir, who 
explained his idea to them, and told them to think it 
over and see who could do this work, either by such 
syphons or a pump that would work by itself. They 
retired and gave several days to the consideration of 
the problem, and making various experiments, and I 
heard of the matter by their eventually coming to me 
in ones and twos, to ask my opinion and advice. 

In the iron and brass foundries, I found that the 
quantity of fuel allowed for drying moulds and cores 
was so small that almost half of the castings turned 
out bad. This was another case of saving money for 
the Government by the official in charge, whose pay 
had been increased for so doing, as a well-wisher of 
the Government. The great percentage of bad cast- 
ings caused thereby was an item of loss not considered 
until I pointed it out. 

The Afghan officials who manage shops or works 
of any description very much resemble the travelling 
M.P. who spends three or four months in India in the 
cold season, and then goes home prepared to explain 
the cause of, and a remedy for, all problems connected 
with its governing. 

The Kabul workshops comprise two large machine- 
shops, with about a hundred machines of sorts ; two 
cartridge-making shops with machinery for turning 
out solid drawn Martini and Snider cartridges ; metal 
fuze shop, blacksmiths' shops, steam hammer shop, 
iron and brass foundries, mint, rolling-mill shop, 
and the boiler and engine houses. There are besides 

234 



Trades and Commerce 

these, hand shops for making limbers and wheels of 
guns, gun cartridges, cartridge and shell filling, 
artillery harness, bandoliers, boots, etc., gun browning, 
black powder, percussion cap powder, leather tanning 
and currying, soap and candle, spirit distilling, acid 
making, electro-plating and polishing, sword and 
bayonet making and grinding, bullet moulding, tin 
and copper work, carpentry, pattern making, paint- 
ing, household furniture making, etc. Between four 
and five thousand men are employed. 

The Afghan workman is intelligent, and can, if 
he will only give his mind to his work, or domestic 
or other affairs will allow him to do so, do work 
requiring considerable skill and intelligence in a 
manner which is highly creditable. This is the 
Afghan workman at his best. In the case of work 
requiring very exact fitting or finish, they generally 
fail, mostly because they have not thoroughly 
mastered the art of making gauges and working to 
them, and it is chiefly on this account that the field 
and machine guns are unreliable. In some cases a 
workman appears to have displayed a considerable 
amount of ingenuity in ascertaining the wrong way 
to do a thing and then so doing it ; but there is, 
however, no doubt, that with education and training 
the Afghan would make a fine workman. I have 
often known a man ruin his work, otherwise well 
finished, through lack of technical knowledge of 
some process in one part of it, and I was generally 
applied to for help after the failure, for they all 

235 



Under the Absolute Amir 

like to do things off their own bat, if they can, 
hoping, thereby, to get all the credit from the 
Amir. Much of the reason for their not applying 
to any one for help is the fault of the officials, who, 
when bringing a man with some special work he 
has done before the Amir, claim that the man was 
at a standstill in this or that way during its process, 
and that they assisted him in his difficulty, thus 
cheapening the work of the man's hands to their 
own credit, and in some cases the official claims the 
entire credit, making out that the man worked to 
instructions. However, it is one of the results of 
the system of government that all men try to bring 
themselves to the Amir's favourable notice, and the 
means are of little account for so desirable an end. 

In all work there is an ustad (teacher or fore- 
man) and his shagirds (pupils or workmen). When 
the shagird has learnt all he can learn from his 
ustad, or thinks he has, he usually casts about for 
a way of ousting his master and taking his place 
himself. This he generally sets about doing by 
privately reporting to the Amir that his ustad 
indents for much more material than his work re- 
quires, and sells the surplus to help defray his living 
expenses, which, as all his neighbours will testify, 
are far above his income. This does not always 
have the effect aimed at, and cause the ustad to 
lose his position that the shagird may jump into 
it ; but the ustad is perhaps made a prisoner, and 
wears leg irons as he goes about his work as usual 

236 



Trades and Commerce 

during the day, and at night is taken back to 
prison, while the mirzas set about the task of check- 
ing his accounts, and as this is a work of years, 
the ustad often dies before the matter is settled. 

In any work which is accompanied by risk, such 
as powder making, etc., the Afghan gets careless of 
precautions after a time, and the result is an occa- 
sional explosion, which kills many and unnerves 
the rest for a month or two, but eventually the 
same carelessness prevails, until another accident 
makes them cautious again for a time. The making 
of fulminate of mercury was prolific of accidents at 
one time, but no further accidents happened after I 
introduced the usual method of preparation, but 
some accidents occurred through roughly handling 
the filled percussions caps, and once sixty thousand 
of them exploded through carelessness on the part 
of one of the foremen, who took up a few of them 
to look at, and then threw them back into the box 
where the rest were; four were killed, and some 
others were permanently disabled, while one man 
was blinded, a cap entering each eye, but was other- 
wise uninjured. In one powder explosion twenty- 
one men were killed, and many others injured, chiefly 
through the force of the explosion bringing down 
a heavy roof on the men who were working under- 
neath. There were several other accidents through 
carelessness, each time causing death or injury to 
one or two, and eventually the Amir gave me 
orders to draw up a list of regulations, and give 

237 



Under the Absolute Amir 

full particulars of what was necessary, in order to 
minimize risk in the making and handling of ex- 
plosives. Having sanctioned this, the necessary 
work was put in hand, and the regulations came 
into force, after which the accidents stopped. 

The pay of the workman is mostly fixed at 
starvation rates, though several of the men, who 
have had their pay increased for doing some small 
work for the Amir himself, get too much so far as 
ability is concerned. The workshops were started 
about eighteen years ago, and the pay of many of 
the workmen, who were boys when they were first 
engaged, is still the same, although they have be- 
come of greater value to the Government by the 
experience they have gained, and that which makes 
it still harder for them is that the price of food 
has increased tremendously, and bread, which is 
their chief food, is four times the price now to what 
it was then. There are men who have been work- 
ing on special machines from the time the shops 
started, drawing eight rupees per month (55. 4<i.), 
and these are men with wives and families, and 
sometimes other female relatives dependent on them. 
How they live on it is a problem, but they are 
men with no surplus adipose substance on their 
bones, as may be imagined. Others, and they are 
mostly boys, who are taken on now for any new 
work, commence at ten rupees (6s. Sd.) per month. 
Most of the ordinary machine men (turners, etc.), 
and hand-fitters, get from twenty to thirty rupees 

238 



Trades and Commerce 

per month (135. 4d to 205.). Ustads get from 
twenty to one hundred rupees per month (135. 4c?. 
to 665. Bd.). 

Excepting in the Government workshops there 
are very few trades carried on in the country. The 
few trades there are, and they are all carried on in 
a small way only, are coppersmiths, tinsmiths, black- 
smiths, gold and silversmiths, carpenters, leather 
workers, etc. The bulk of the commerce of the 
country is confined to dried fruits, which are ex- 
ported to India and Russia. Fresh grapes are also 
sent to India, wrapped in wool, and enclosed in 
small round wooden boxes. Kabul and its neigh- 
bourhood produce large quantities of very good 
grapes, which sell in the season at about a penny 
for eight pounds, and for the best varieties at about 
a farthing per pound. I made wine from these 
grapes, blending two or three sorts; and after 
maturing for three years or so, it was equal to any 
of the wines commonly sold in India, and being 
pure grape juice, it was perhaps better than most. 
Apricots are also grown in large quantities, and 
grapes and apricots form the bulk of the dried fruits 
exported. Grain is also exported, though not in 
large quantities ; but, with cheap means of carriage, 
a large trade in several articles could be brought 
about. Most fruits and vegetables grow well in 
Kabul, and large crops are given, the climate being 
particularly adapted for all fruits not requiring a 
tropical sun. In Jelalabad and Kandahar districts 

239 



Under the Absolute Amir 

the heat is such that most tropical fruits are grown, 
and in the former district sugar-cane is produced in 
large quantities. 

A good deal of silk is also produced, and the 
country offers great facilities for an extensive culti- 
vation of the silkworm. The silk is at present pro- 
duced in three districts Bokhara, Herat, and 
Kohistan, and there only in comparatively small 
quantities. Carpets are also made : those similar 
to Persian carpets in Herat and Turkestan, and felt 
carpets in Kandahar and Hazara. Cloth of various 
descriptions is also manufactured by means of hand- 
looms in different parts of the country, and in Ghazni 
numbers of posteens (overcoats) are made from sheep 
skins. Most of the latter articles are not exported, 
for only enough is produced to meet the demands 
of the country. Numbers of camels, horses, cattle, 
and sheep are bred in different districts, but few 
are exported, and for the past few years horses are 
not allowed to be taken out of the country for sale, 
something having been said about them being bought 
up for the use of the Indian army. Turkestan is 
the best cattle and horse-raising country in Afghani- 
stan, as it possesses large tracts of fertile country 
for grazing ; and to hear Turkestanis talk of the 
agricultural and mineral richness of their country, 
one would imagine it the Eldorado. A small 
quantity of timber is floated down the river from 
the Jelalabad district for sale in India, but the 
quantity is very small, for the hills and mountains 

240 



Trades and Commerce 

in Afghanistan are for the most part quite barren, 
and there are very few trees except in one or two 
isolated places, and not many there. 

There is little or no rainfall in the country, but 
in the winter snowstorms are frequent, and the 
melting of the snow on the mountains gives the 
water required for the crops during spring and 
summer, the water being led over the land by means 
of channels for the necessary irrigation. These 
irrigation channels are cleaned out every spring, 
and on the day appointed for clearing the stream, 
all the men who use the water are called together 
by drum and fife (or an instrument similar to it), 
and they work up stream each day in a body, 
clearing away weeds, and deepening the channel 
where it has silted up until the whole is finished. 

There are frequent fights among cultivators about 
the first use of the water from the subsidiary chan- 
nels, for it frequently happens that the smaller ones 
do not carry enough water to irrigate the land on 
both sides at once, and naturally quarrels ensue as 
to who shall have the water first. Long handled 
spades are generally in the hands of those who are 
quarrelling, and these are used, and men are killed 
at times, for the spade inflicts a heavy blow and 
cuts deeply. The quarrels also frequently lead to 
one man firing the other's crops in revenge, and 
then lawsuits, with numbers of paid witnesses on 
both sides, result. 

The mills for grinding flour are fixed at 

241 R 



Under the Absolute Amir 

convenient points on the irrigation streams, and are 
worked by water-wheels, which, however, have a 
very low efficiency, less than a quarter of the power 
available being transmitted to the mill. The mills 
are of a very old type; one stone revolves on a 
fixed lower one, and the grain is fed in at a hole 
pierced near the centre of the upper stone. The 
flour from the first grinding is very coarse, and it 
is reground two or more times, according to the 
degree of fineness required. 

There is a great want in Afghanistan of some 
cheap and speedy means of carrying freight. At 
present the cumbersome method of carrying all things 
by pack-animals is the only means at disposal, and 
the time occupied in getting over a short distance 
necessarily makes the system a costly one, for it 
takes a week for them to travel a hundred miles, and 
the cost of doing so works out at about eighteen 
shillings a hundred- weight for that distance, and this 
in a country where all things are cheap. The weight 
and size of any article carried is also limited to the 
carrying capacity of the horse or camel employed. 

The Koochee people do most of the carrying of 
goods from place to place, and they are a hardy race, 
similar to gipsies in having no fixed home. They 
move about in caravans of fifty to a hundred animals, 
which include camels, horses, donkeys, and sheep, for 
sheep have to carry small packs too. The women 
and children travel with the caravan wherever it 
goes, and the household pots and pans, with a few 

242 



Trades and Commerce 

fowl, are carried on the top of a donkey, the fowl, 
with their feet tied to prevent escape, sitting on the 
top of the pack, and the baby, if there is one, 
wrapped in a shawl, and carried in a bundle beside 
them. They often have a large number of sheep 
with them, and when the lambs are too young to 
stand the journey the boys and girls carry them in 
their arms. When they stop for a while at any 
place they rig up rough huts, composed of sticks 
covered with mats or grass, but at other times the 
shelter of a tree or rock suffices. They are a finely 
built people, with free, graceful movements, due, no 
doubt, to the open-air life they lead and the constant 
exercise, and as no sickly child could live such a life, 
it is a case of the survival of the fittest. 

One such caravan passed me one day while I was 
standing near a road I was constructing through a 
ravine, and the reports from some blasting going on 
near by made one of the young camels bolt. In 
doing so he collided with a full-grown girl of the 
caravan, and she was thrown some distance, landing 
with a good deal of force on some sharp jutting 
boulders and stones. I started forward, thinking 
she must be killed ; but the girl, after a few 
moments, sprang up, brushed the dust from her 
clothes, and walked on unconcernedly. The Koochee 
women are not purdah, though they cover their faces 
with a shawl as they pass an Englishman. During 
the harvest months, when the heat of the lowland 
plains is too great for the pack-animals, and there is 

243 



Under the Absolute Amir 

little carrying work done, the Koochee people move 
from one place to another, working as harvesters, 
and when the crops of one district are cut and in, they 
go on to another ; for owing to differences in altitude 
the harvesting time in different districts varies. The 
men who look after the camels fasten them at night- 
time in a circle, so that the camels, in a way, form a 
wheel, with bodies as spokes, and noses pointing to 
the hub. The man, when he sleeps, lies down in the 
centre under the necks of the camels, and rests there 
unmolested by them. 

Tea is imported into the country through India. 

Generally speaking, the Chinese green tea only is 

consumed, and it is shipped from China to Bombay, 

and thence railed up to Peshawar for the Kabul 

merchants, and to Quetta for the Kandahar and 

Herat merchants. From Peshawar to Kabul, and 

from Quetta to Kandahar it is carried on by camels. 

A large quantity of tea is imported annually, and 

only the very poor use the Indian hill tea, as they 

cannot afford the other, which sells at three shillings 

to five shillings a pound. I once tried to introduce 

an Indian green tea into Kabul ; but they did not 

care for its flavour, and the fact of it being Indian 

tea was sufficient to condemn it in their opinion. 

Other articles imported are cotton goods, cloth, 
silks, and velvets. Of the latter two, large quantities 
are used by the women, and at one time men and 
boys dressed a good deal in silks and velvets also ; 
but the new court fashion is black cloth, so the 

244 



Trades and Commerce 

demand for them is getting less with the men. 
Saddlery and leather goods, old clothes, sugar, and 
other household necessaries, are brought up by 
merchants from India; but the trade in them is 
very small. 

There are no measures in Kabul for grain, liquids, 
etc., and all things are sold by weight. The weights 
differ from those used in India, and are built up 
from the nukhut, a description of pulse about the 
size of a pea, the weight of each seed of which is 
fairly equal. Twenty-four of these nukhuts go to 
a miskal (six and one-sixth miskals nearly equal 
an ounce) ; ninety-six miskals equal one pao, which 
is slightly less than an English pound ; sixteen pau 
equal one seer, and eighty seers equal one kharwar. 
Excepting in the Government stores there are no 
exact weights made and used ; the people in the 
bazar taking stones of different sizes and using them 
as weights, the difference between the stone and the 
true weight being on the side of the shopkeeper of 
course. In lineal measure there are two different 
yards, or guz, as they are called. The one used by 
surveyors and builders is nearly twenty-eight inches, 
and the other guz for measuring cloth, etc., is nearly 
forty-two inches. The kro, or mile, is, as I have 
already mentioned, an indefinite quantity, but is 
usually taken to be about one and a half English 
miles. 

The Government offices are controlled and worked 
by the mirzas, or clerks. The mirza is looked upon 

2 45 



Under the Absolute Amir 

as an educated man in the country, but his education 
is limited to Persian literature, a smattering of the 
old Arabic, and the first four rules of arithmetic ; 
but even in these first four rules he is far from 
proficient, and when it comes to a fraction being 
included in the calculation, he is hopelessly lost. 
I was present once when some eight or ten of them 
together tried to solve a calculation which involved 
multiplication only, and all of them arrived at 
different results, while the man who was nearest 
the correct answer took a good deal of credit to 
himself for being so nearly right. The mirzas are 
a class of themselves, although drawn from all 
classes, and they differ from the rest of the popula- 
tion in their nervous and soft manner, at the back 
of which, however, is a nature as cruel and heartless 
as any in the country. It is not the cleverest 
mirza in his work who comes to the front and 
has charge of departments, but the one who is 
cleverest in deceit and intrigue, and it is to excel- 
lence in these respects that the young mirza gives 
attention, when he listens to his elders making up 
a case, with words and meaning purposely involved, 
to give them a loophole of escape should their 
scheme fall through. The mirzas are full of cunning, 
and difficult for the layman to trap, and they are 
ever scheming one against the other, or against 
other people who have money, that they may in 
one way or another get them in their coils and 
squeeze them (as they put it). 

246 



Trades and Commerce 

The work they prize most is taking the accounts 
of one of themselves, or of some official whom they 
have already reported to the Amir, as swindling the 
Government of lakhs of rupees, and undertaking in 
their report to prove what they say. After reporting 
such a case, they are generally given the task of 
proving their accusation, and this necessitates the 
accused person's accounts being gone through. In 
doing this they are weighed by no consideration of 
the figures shown in the books and papers under 
examination, but search their minds for an idea of 
some allegation which will involve the accused and be 
difficult for him to refute, and then, for proof of lesser 
wrong- doing which will give colour to the greater 
alleged wrong, they look through the papers, and, as 
no official is guileless in the conduct of his duties, it 
is usually easy to get up a few bad-looking cases 
against him. Then they go into figures, and I have 
known men accused of swindling more than double 
the amount which has actually passed through their 
hands ; and to do this without being detected is 
simpler than it appears, for very few persons besides 
the mirzas can do more than count up to twenty, 
and the mirza's papers give the figures and other 
proofs of the huge sums swindled. Then all of them 
go before the Amir, together with the papers and 
other proofs (?), and in the end the accused is put in 
prison together with his family, and all his money 
and other property is confiscated. To be correct, not 
all is confiscated, for a good deal of money has 

247 



Under the Absolute Amir 

already gone into the investigating mirza's hands in 
a vain attempt to induce him to withdraw his charge, 
or at least reduce his figures ; but although the mirza 
will hold out hopes until he gets the money, he 
knows that, having begun, he must ruin the man 
and have him put where he is harmless, or else there 
will be an ever active enemy lying in wait for him. 
However, there is always requital, for no one mirza 
holds any position for long, and a day comes when the 
intriguer is himself treated in the same way, and is 
put in prison or killed. Two or three years is the 
usual limit of a mirza's tenure of high office, for 
their methods of attracting money to themselves soon 
lead to exposure by other mirzas who become envious 
and want the position themselves, in order that they, 
too, may make something, and have a merry, if a 
short, life. 

In getting up cases, the mirzas do as others do, 
and pay false witnesses, and this leads at times to 
the Amir being at a loss to know which side is right, 
and ordering them all to be tortured with the fanah 
in order to find out the truth. I saw two mirzas, 
who were accused of falsifying accounts, being pub- 
licly fanah'd in the bazar one day as I rode through ; 
but they were making statements very rapidly with 
the minimum of pressure on the fanah. Their endur- 
ance is less than that of the other men of the country, 
and this is no doubt due to a sedentary life and in- 
cessant smoking, for wherever you see a mirza, there, 
too, you will see a chillum. 

248 




H 
4 



Trades and Commerce 

The mirzas have various ways of making money, 
and one is in the collection of customs duties and 
various taxes, when they make all they can out of 
the people who have to pay. If they have to give 
a receipt to any man for money paid, or goods 
delivered, they will keep the man waiting all day 
for it, or even for a few days, if he gives them 
nothing. The equivalent of a penny is accepted if 
the man is poor and they see he can give no 
more. Men coming into Kabul and having to travel 
two or three days to get there to pay some duty or 
tax of less than a rupee, have been kept waiting for 
days because they refused to give the mirza a few 
annas ; so the people see that it saves money to give 
to the mirzas, and if they complain to a higher 
authority the mirza and all in his office will swear 
that the man never came near them. Again, if 
money has to be paid to a man from the Government 
treasury he must give some of it to the mirza who 
pays it out, and this is taken so much for granted 
that the mirza usually hands it over one or more 
rupees short, according to the amount of money that 
has to be paid. 

The late Amir used to give salaries to very few of 
the mirzas employed on Government work. He said 
they made money from the people whether they got 
a salary or not, and as the people would not com- 
plain to him, they might pay for the mirzas an 
economical way of looking at the matter. The 
Government storekeepers are all mirzas, and 

249 



Under the Absolute Amir 

apparently make a good thing out of it, for they wear 
good clothes, ride good horses, and have many wives 
and women in their houses, though their pay is seldom 
more than the equivalent of ten pounds a year. 
However, as there is no system of stock-taking, and 
no ones knows what is, or is not, in the stores, it is 
an easy matter for them to make money out of such 
a job, but their tenure of office is usually a short one, 
some one or other of those under them reporting 
their shortcomings, probably because they were given 
too small a share of the plunder. 

If an Afghan owes money, it is similar to getting 
blood out of a stone to make him pay it ; usually the 
odds in both cases are equal, unless a considerable 
amount of pressure can be applied. With many of 
them it looks as though their hearts were wrung 
when having to pay up, for it is done with a gloomy 
countenance and a display of considerable temper, as 
though they were being robbed by force of hard- 
earned gains. The method the late Amir inaugurated 
for the payment of debts was to send soldiers to 
the house of the debtor for the money, and if it was 
not at once forthcoming, the soldiers quartered them- 
selves on the man, and partook of the best in the 
house, and if there was no best in the house, 
the man was made to get it as quickly as pos- 
sible, or feel the weight of the butt end of a rifle. 
Under these circumstances the debtor lost no time in 
settling up, if only for the sake of getting rid of his 
unwelcomed guests, who turned the house upside 

250 



Trades and Commerce 

down, and involved him in the loss of several rupees 
each day for their food and tobacco. Any person 
proving a debt could apply to Government for these 
soldiers, or mahsuls as they are called, and the 
soldiers employed for the purpose became quite 
experienced in turning these visits to their own 
advantage. 

There is a colony of Hindoos in Kabul which has 
been there for many generations. They are the 
money-lenders to the people, as the Jews used to 
be in other countries. Also they do almost all the 
dealing in precious stones and jewellery, and of late 
years most families have been forced to sell much of 
the jewellery they possessed, the increased cost of 
living necessitating it, in order that they should not 
starve. Whatever a Hindoo offers for an article may 
be looked upon as being never more than two-thirds 
of its value, and the people, among themselves, when 
selling anything to one another, say that the Hindoos 
offer to give so much for it, and therefore it must be 
worth the money they themselves ask. Some of the 
Hindoos are employed in the Treasury offices as being 
more trustworthy than the mirzas, and also better 
accountants. 

The money of the country is all coined in Kabul, 
the mint, with its up-to-date coining presses, being 
situated in the workshops, where the presses are at 
times kept working day and night when large sums 
of money are required quickly. When the late Amir, 
who wanted money badly, saw the revenues yearly 

251 



Under the Absolute Amir 

dwindling, he cast about for means to increase it, 
and one day the idea of doing so in the following 
way occurred to him. The Kabul rupee used to be 
an irregularly shaped coin, hand-stamped, but it was 
made of pure silver, so the Amir had all these rupees 
collected and melted down as they accumulated, and 
as they were melted down a fairly high percentage of 
copper was added. This alloyed silver was then cast 
into bars, rolled, and coined afresh in the new mint, 
which turns out a rupee with a milled edge and 
pressed with nicely engraved dies. In this way, by 
melting down the old pure silver rupees and adding 
copper before re-coining, the Amir made a consider- 
able amount of profit, and when the old rupees of his 
own country were finished, he collected Persian rupees 
and added copper to those ; but, unfortunately, under 
one of the Shahs, the same thing had already been 
done, so that many of the Afghan rupees contain 
more than double the proportion of copper than is 
usual in the standard coinage of other countries. 
Thereafter the Amir ordered the collection of those 
Persian rupees which were coined under other Shahs, 
and the exchange offered for these rupees in the 
Kabul treasury was one Persian for one Kabuli rupee ; 
but to make still further profit, the Amir ordered 
that one pice less than a Kabuli rupee should be 
given in exchange for each Persian one, and the 
Shah, on hearing this, ordered a like reduction in 
exchange on all Afghan money brought into his 
country. The result of adding an unusual amount of 

252 



Trades and Commerce 

copper to the rupee, together with other causes, how- 
ever, depreciated its value in India, where five Kabuli 
rupees used to be taken in exchange for four Indian, 
and the exchange nowadays is two Kabuli for one 
Indian. 



253 



CHAPTER XV 

GEOLOGICAL CONDITIONS OF THE COUNTRY 

Kabul valley once crater of volcano Earthquakes Kabul once a large 
lake Mines outcropping, gold, lead, copper, coal, etc. Rivers, and 
gold in them Existence of kept secret for fear of trouble 
Turkestan mines The question of fuel for Kabul workshops Local 
supply exhausted Coal under the valley of Kabul. 

IT is probable that the Valley of Kabul is the crater 
of an ancient volcano, for, in addition to other 
indications, there are in many places in the surround- 
ing hills traces of volcanic action to be seen in the 
way of lava cones. At many places, also, are large 
beds of mingled lava and small stones, which have 
the appearance of extensive concrete blocks, and they 
might readily be mistaken for them. Several of these 
beds are many hundred yards in length and breadth, 
and they mostly lie at the foot of a hill, where they 
look like the foundations of a large fort or palace, 
from which the superstructure has crumbled and dis- 
appeared, and the rain of centuries has washed away 
the surrounding earth and left only the concrete beds 
to mark the spot where they stood. It seems likely 
that the molten lava flowing down the adjoining hill- 
side picked up small stones in its progress, and on 

254 



Geological Conditions of the Country 

reaching the level ground below spread itself out over 
the land and cooled down into a solid block. 

The strata of the ground surrounding Kabul is 
in a very disturbed condition, some of the hills and 
mountains about showing the strata standing per- 
pendicularly, as though the earth of a flat country 
had been lifted bodily and thrown up on end, as, no 
doubt, it had been. 

Earthquakes are of very common occurrence, and 
usually the greater number and those of most violence 
occur in October or November. The one which was 
worse than all others that I experienced there happened 
at the end of December, and as the walls of the Kabul 
houses are built of mud bricks, with very heavy roofs 
superimposed, many houses were brought down by 
the shock, and several people killed through the walls 
and roofs falling on them. Preceding this earthquake 
a violent storm of wind arose, which broke off large 
branches from the trees and threatened to beat the 
windows in, and when the wind had been raging for 
an hour or so, the earthquake commenced. It came 
on about ten o'clock at night, and at the time it com- 
menced I was standing before one of the windows of 
the guest house, which is fortunately solidly built, 
and when the shaking and rattling of the windows 
began, I thought it was due to the wind, and remarked 
to the others in the room that if it continued in 
violence the windows would soon be blown in; but 
while I was speaking the floor started swinging from 
side to side, and then I made a dash for the doorway, 

255 



Under the Absolute Amir 

and stood there until the disturbance ceased. The 
doorways are safer than other places in a house 
during an earthquake, as, should the roof fall in, 
one stands a chance of escaping unhurt. It is difficult 
to judge the length of time an earthquake lasts, for 
one is more interested in the probabilities attending 
it, but it seemed four or five minutes before the 
tremors finally ceased, and then I saw that large 
cracks had been formed down the walls of the room, 
although they are five or six feet thick, and the next 
day I heard of different houses completely thrown 
down and the people in them killed. 

The late Amir, who was ill with gout at the time, 
was sitting in durbar, and as soon as the earth- 
quake commenced, all those with him ran out at once 
and left him sitting there, unable to move. With his 
constitutional dread of earthquakes, his feelings, when 
he found himself deserted, may be imagined ; but he 
was not left for long, for three or four of the slave- 
boys rushed back as soon as the violence began to 
subside, and carried him out into the garden. The 
shock, however, affected the Amir so much that, as 
a thanksgiving for his escape from harm, on the 
following day he ordered three to four hundred 
prisoners to be released. My Hindustani servants 
were asleep in their room when the disturbance 
started, and, roused from sleep by the violence of 
the shaking, and not knowing the cause, for this was 
their first experience of an earthquake, they rushed 
out into the open, lightly clad as they were, and, 

256 



Geological Conditions of the Country 

sinking on their knees in the snow, prayed aloud to 
be protected from the calamity that was upon them, 
and they were down with fever the next day, the 
result of exposure and nervous shock. 

In Kohistan, close to Kabul, earthquakes of such 
violence occur at times that the mangers for feeding 
horses are thrown down. These mangers, which are 
built of stone and mud, stand some three feet high only, 
and are fairly thick, so that the shaking of the earth 
may be imagined when such are overthrown. In 
1899 the fortune-tellers prophesied that in the month 
which corresponded to November of that year many 
earthquakes would be experienced, and the last earth- 
quake of all would happen on a certain day, which 
they specified, and would be of such violence that 
all Kabul would be demolished. Strangely enough, 
towards the end of that month earthquakes were of 
continued occurrence for about two weeks, and not a 
day passed without at least one shock being felt, and 
on some days there were many, both during the day 
and night. Although earthquakes are usual towards 
the end of the year, a prolonged continuation was 
very exceptional, and the fortune-tellers' prediction 
affected the people to such extent that those who 
had tents pitched them on the ground outside the 
city walls, and lived in them, for they fully believed 
that as the prophecy was in part fulfilled, the rest of 
it would come about also, and that it was foolish to 
live in a house that was appointed to fall on a certain 
day, and in its fall would crush them. The Amir, 

257 s 



Under the Absolute Amir 

however, who had consulted his own fortune-tellers, 
gave orders that any person found living in a tent 
outside the city on the day following his procla- 
mation would be imprisoned, so all of them had 
perforce to return to their houses. But, in spite of 
the Amir's assurance, the appointed day for the 
overthrowing of Kabul was passed in fear and 
trembling by the majority of the people, which was 
not allayed by the day commencing with one huge 
shock, which made the whole city tremble. How- 
ever, no further shocks happened, and that was the 
last one felt for several months. 

Some of the earthquakes which occurred from 
time to time were of the nature of a single bump, 
while others were of a rumbling and shaking 
character. I have noticed that the latter sort, 
which on one or two occasions occurred at night 
when all was quiet, and I was lying in bed before 
falling asleep, could be heard coming before they 
could be felt under the house to make it shake, 
and could also be heard pass on, travelling from the 
south-west towards the north-east. These earth- 
quakes resembled a very heavy drag driven along 
a bumpy underground road, which, as it passed 
immediately underneath, made the house vibrate, 
and then could be heard passing on until lost in 
the distance. 

The subsoil indications show that the valley of 
Kabul was at one time a large lake, and that the valley 
was not once, but many times submerged, and it is said 

258 



Geological Conditions of the Country 

by the people a story has been handed down to 
them that where Kabul is now was once a great lake 
of many miles in circumference. It is probable that 
at the point where the river flows through a cleft in 
the mountains which surround Kabul on its way 
down to India, landslips occurred at times, which 
blocked up the outlet of the river, and caused the 
water to rise until all the surrounding country was 
submerged, and the water went on rising until it was 
so high that the dam caused by the landslip was 
unable to hold it back, and then the obstacle would 
be swept away, and the valley drained of its water, 
and remain dry until another landslip blocked the 
river's progress once again. From the appearance of 
the sub-strata when making excavations, I concluded 
that there had been many inundations, and the 
thicknesses of the different deposits superimposed one 
on the other, showed the floods to have lasted for 
varying periods of time. On the mountain sides 
around Kabul there are also rocks and boulders 
which have the appearance of being water-washed, 
and in some places the under-part of rocky cliffs are 
holed through and worn smooth by the action of 
water, similar to cliffs on the seashore, and as 
some of these appear at very high levels, it would 
lead one to suppose that the Kabul valley was at one 
time of much greater extent, and subterranean dis- 
turbances subsequently threw up high some of those 
portions of the land which were formerly under 
water. The rocks on the Asman Heights, past which 

259 



Under the Absolute Amir 

the river flows, are water-marked and worn up to 
some fifty yards above the level of the river, which is 
probably the height to which some of the floods rose. 

In the mountains near Khurd Kabul, about thirty 
miles from Kabul, thin seams of new coal have been 
found outcropping. There are several seams de- 
posited one on the other, and they vary in thickness 
from a sixteenth of an inch to eight or nine inches, 
and are separated by thin layers of clay, the thicker 
seams of coal being lower than the thinner ones. 
In some cases three inches in thickness of the strata 
show about twelve different deposits of carbonaceous 
matter, and point to various short periods of inunda- 
tion following in rapid succession. 

Throughout Afghanistan the strata are in a most 
disturbed condition, and in innumerable places veins 
of ore, which are rich in metal, are found outcropping 
on the mountain sides. Ores of copper, lead, silver, 
zinc, tin, nickel, etc., are numerous. Gold is found 
in the sand of several of the northern rivers, and it 
is said the river Oxus is rich in it too. Gold-bearing 
quartz was found within a couple of miles of Kanda- 
har, but it has been exhausted. Samples which have 
been kept of the gold embedded in a matrix of quartz 
show the mine to have been a rich one, and it is said 
that large quantities of gold were obtained from it 
by former Amirs. Many of the copper ores sent me 
to assay were very rich in metal, and samples con- 
taining thirty to forty per cent, of copper were 
common, and there were others with about sixty per 

260 



Geological Conditions of the Country 

cent, of metal, while in some of the veins of ore 
native copper was present. Lead ores of over seventy 
per cent, of metal are worked to obtain the required 
quantity of lead for bullet-moulding, and one lead 
ore which was sent me for assay contained a little 
over ten per cent, of silver. In the Sher Darwaza 
Heights is a vein of copper ore which runs through- 
out its length, outcropping here and there, but it is 
a thin seam and rather poor in metal, as compared 
with other ores round about, but the percentage is 
enough to pay handsomely for its working. In other 
parts of the mountains round Kabul, however, are 
veins of copper ore of sufficient extent and richness 
to supply the requirements of Europe for several 
years, and if the country was thoroughly prospected, 
it is probable that the existence of still further deposits 
would be revealed. 

The people of the country are very chary of 
giving information of the existence of ores in their 
locality, fearing that if such are known to exist, the 
Amir will have the mines worked, and then the 
people of the neighbourhood will be pressed to labour 
on them, and as that means taking them away 
from their fields and crops to work hard and long on 
a small pay, the prospect does not appeal to them. 
Should the Amir decide to take advantage of the 
mineral wealth of his country, this is what would 
happen, no doubt ; but, for some unknown reason, the 
Amir prefers that these mines, of the richness of 
which he is cognisant, should remain unworked ; and 

261 



Under the Absolute Amir 

yet he appointed several sappers and miners to pros- 
pect the whole of the country and bring in samples 
of all rocks, etc., which had the appearance of being 
of value and were different in colour and weight to 
the common rocks and earth ; and these men were 
placed under me, and I had orders to go over the 
samples they brought in and assay and report on 
those which contained metals. From this I gathered 
the impression that the Amir eventually intended 
working the mines, but up to the time I left the 
country nothing had been said or done to this end. 
The lead ores are worked for the use of the Govern- 
ment, and the Amir has proved that his people are 
sufficiently intelligent to learn and carry out any 
work taught them, and he had sufficient confidence 
in my report on ores to send the lead-smelting men 
to work on another ore which I recommended when 
that of the old working ran out, so that it is difficult 
to understand why the exploitation of the mines is 
not put in hand ; but I have sometimes thought that 
the Amir perhaps fears the cupidity of his powerful 
neighbours, should he by working the mines of his 
country give practical evidence of its richness, and 
thereby lose it. 

The people of Turkestan, when speaking of the 
richness of their country in mineral wealth, claim 
that it is much more wealthy than the rest of 
Afghanistan, but no ores from that country were 
sent to me for assay. One Turkistani chief brought 
with him, when on a visit to the Amir, an ore which 

262 



Geological Conditions of the Country 

he said contained gold, but it turned out to be iron 
pyrites. This chief is not the only man who has 
made that mistake, for ores of iron pyrites exemplify 
the old saying that all is not gold that glitters. At 
Durrah-i-Yusef, in Turkestan, a seam of coal out- 
crops in the valley, but it is new coal or lignite. 
The seam has been described to me as some six feet 
in thickness, and of considerable extent. There are 
many uses to which this coal could be put, and 
several tons of it were brought to Kabul to try as 
fuel in the boiler-house instead of wood, and the 
experiment was successful ; but the cost of carrying 
the coal by camels over the intervening ranges of 
mountains, a three weeks' journey, was prohibitive. 

The question of obtaining fuel for the boilers in 
the Kabul workshops has lately become of urgent 
importance, for the trees of the country up to several 
days' journey from Kabul have been used up, and 
further fuel is barely obtainable, while the young 
trees which have been planted in places for a future 
supply of fuel will not be ready for cutting for eight 
years or more to come. In an effort to remedy 
matters, the present Amir, a year or so ago, issued 
a proclamation offering a large reward to any one 
finding coal near to Kabul. The reward was to be 
thirty thousand rupees for coal found within five 
miles of the city, twenty thousand rupees within ten 
miles, ten thousand within twenty miles, and so on. 
But there was one stipulation, and that was, that 
the coal found should be so located that a road 

263 



Under the Absolute Amir 

could be constructed up to within a mile of the 
mine for wheeled traffic, otherwise the amount of 
reward would be reduced in proportion to the dis- 
tance from the mine to which carts could be brought. 
The proclamation resulted in the country for many 
miles around being very thoroughly prospected by 
the people, and although very few of them had ever 
seen coal, they eventually found thin seams out- 
cropping in several places, which evidently belonged 
to one original bed or field of coal before subter- 
ranean disturbances dislocated the sub-strata around. 
I was sent to inspect and report on these outcrops, 
and found that it was new coal in such thin seams 
that the yield would not repay the cost of working, 
and borings failed to reveal the existence of thicker 
seams within easy reach below. A gang of my men, 
who were appointed to search further afield, found 
thick seams of new coal at Sheikh Ali, some six 
days' journey from Kabul towards Hazara, and 
further outcrops were discovered at other places on 
the same range of mountains ; but in this case also 
the intervening mountains made the cost of camel 
transport far too expensive for the Government to 
take advantage of the find, and the Amir is strongly 
prejudiced against anything in the way of tram or 
light railways, which would be the only way of 
carrying coal thence cheaply. 

It is more than probable that the Kabul work- 
shops will have to close soon for want of fuel to 
keep the machines running, and the Amir told me, 

264 



Geological Conditions of the Country 

shortly before I left Kabul, that the local supply 
of wood is exhausted, and that there is little like- 
lihood of coal being found near enough to be of 
value. The last winter I spent in Kabul, wood was 
so scarce that it realized three times the price of 
five years before, and there was very little to be had 
even at that price. 

From the indications given, it seems probable 
that good coal lies under the valley of Kabul ; but 
the late Amir pronounced the coal-boring work I 
commenced as mad-headed, and wanted to know 
what was the advantage of making known the exist- 
ence of coal many hundred feet below the surface, 
for who could get coal from the bowels of the earth, 
which were full of water, as the wells about proved. 
This he said in durbar, and not to me, so I had no 
chance of vindicating my action in the matter. To 
me he simply wrote that he wished the men who 
were employed on that work to be sent about the 
country to see if coal could not be found on the 
hillside, as it was in Turkestan ; and it was not my 
duty to dispute a definite order, nor was the Amir 
the kind of man to listen had I done so, for he would 
never acknowledge himself in the wrong after forming 
an opinion. 



265 



CHAPTER XVI 

RELIGION 

Suni and Shiah Moullahs and their influence on the people Jihads or 
holy wars The Koran Late Amir's distrust of Moullahs Holy 
men, fakirs, and holy graves Madmen and reverence paid them as 
God-stricken Sayid and Hafiz Beggars and alms Stoning to death 
for religous offences Prayers Punishments for not knowing prayers 
Musjids Ramazan and fastings Haj Afghan colony in Australia 
Lawful and unlawful food Plurality of wives. 

THE religion of the Afghans is the Mussulman, or 
Mahomedan religion, as it is more generally called 
in Christian countries, and if the people were to act 
up to the tenets of their religion, as taught by the 
Koran, then a good Mussulman would be a good 
man, for it is as a rule the people who practice 
a religion who bring credit or discredit on it. There 
are two sects of this religion in the country, the 
Shiah and the Suni. The latter sect includes the 
royal family and the bulk of the people, while 
the Shiah sect is chiefly composed of the Kuzil- 
bash people, who are the descendants of Persians. 
These Kuzilbash live in the south-west portion of 
Kabul, called Chindawal, and form a small colony 
of their own ; but a great number of them live 
in Kandahar and Herat, and near the Persian 

266 



m 



Religion 






frontier. The difference between these two sects 
appears to be more in form of ritual than in any 
real difference in belief; but there is, however, a 
great deal of ill-feeling between them, and this leads 
at times to much bloodshed, much as it used to in 
days gone by between those of the Koman Church 
and Protestants. 

The moullahs, or priests, are those who are 
brought up in the musjids, and who understand the 
Koran, or at least can read it in the old Arabic, 
in which language only is it allowed to be written. 
They live a holy life of constant prayer combined 
with a good deal of fasting, and their beads, similar 
to the rosary beads, are always in their hands. 
While walking or sitting, or even carrying on a 
conversation, these beads are rapidly slipped between 
the finger and thumb as they repeat the name of 
God for each bead so handled. The sight of a kafar, 
and all who are not Mussulman are infidels, is so 
obnoxious that they spit on the ground when passing 
him in the street, and to kill one of them is quite 
a meritorious action in their eyes. The majority 
of the people are equally fanatical, and they also 
consider it no sin to lie to or swindle a kafar. 

The influence the moullahs exert over the people 
is very great, and they have little trouble in getting 
them to join in the Jihad or holy war against the 
enemies of their religion. They argue that the 
enemy of their religion is the enemy of God and 
therefore a loathsome thing, and that the Koran 

267 



Under the Absolute Amir 

commands them to kill all such, and promises that 
if they are themselves killed in doing so, they shall 
go straight to Paradise, and that the man who fails 
to kill a kafar, but suffers death himself in the 
attempt, has only a little less rank in heaven than 
the one who succeeds. 

The moullahs also teach that in Paradise good 
Mussulmans shall lie in the shade of gold and 
silver-leafed trees, whose fruits are precious stones, 
with beautiful houri around attending to all their 
desires, and with rivers of milk and honey flowing 
past them ; and in this Paradise, if they desire one 
of the many beautiful birds which sit singing in 
the trees about, it is instantly placed ready cooked 
before them, and when they have eaten, the bird 
will assume its former shape and fly back to the 
branches above, for there is no taking of life in 
Paradise. There is enough in this picture of future 
happiness to fire the desire of the average Afghan, 
for his life is generally one long struggle for existence. 

The Koran is always kept and handled very 
reverently, and when not in use it is wrapped in 
several cloths, and the person who intends reading 
it washes his hands before taking it out of its 
wrappings. The Koran is written in Arabic only, 
and when I wondered why it was not translated by 
competent moullahs into Persian, so that all who 
could read might understand, I was told that the 
language of the Koran was such that no one could 
copy or imitate it, and therefore any translation 

268 



Religion 

must necessarily be full of errors, and the word of 
God violated. For this reason also, those who read 
it are taught to pronounce each word exactly, for the 
short vowels are not written in Arabic, and it would 
be easy for a beginner to wrongly pronounce a word, 
because there are many words which are similarly 
written and differ only in the pronunciation of the 
unwritten short vowels, and therefore the meaning 
would become confused, and they say that there is 
no greater sin than misconstruing the words inspired 
by God. Very few, with the exception of the 
moullahs, can read the Koran, and the latter 
apparently give very free translations when it suits 
their purpose ; such, for instance, as that of killing 
unbelievers, on which is built up the principles of 
Jihad, holy war, and which the Amir has had printed 
in pamphlet form and distributed throughout the 
country of late. I have been assured by Mussulmans 
of other countries that the meaning of the Koran has 
been twisted in this, for true Mussulmans are ex- 
horted in the Koran to live with unbelievers for 
neighbours in such manner that all may know them 
for good and upright men, and when the time comes 
to fight against them, then to fight to the utmost of 
their power. 

The late Amir, who distrusted the moullahs, as 
he had reason to do, for on more than one occasion 
they caused the people to rise against him by pro- 
claiming that he did not act up to his religion and 
was therefore a kafar, always treated them in such 

269 



Under the Absolute Amir 

manner as to lower them in the eyes of the people 
rather than give them honour and uphold their 
influence ; and he did not fail to punish them as he 
did the rest of the people when they deserved it. 
One such case was when the moullahs of a holy 
shrine wrote him a petition praying for money to 
repair the walls and rooms of the tomb, which were 
in a dilapidated condition. A holy grave is usually 
surrounded by a building, in the rooms of which the 
priests who guard the tomb live. The Amir knew 
that this place, in common with others, was much 
visited by women ostensibly for prayer, but in reality 
to keep assignations made with lovers, and that 
many had lovers among the moullahs themselves. A 
woman's prayers usually have her own fruitfulness 
for objective, and they are supposed to have greater 
virtue at a holy shrine, and, under the circumstances, 
it is possible that results in some cases were such as 
to encourage this supposition. The Amir accordingly 
sent for the moullahs, who were sleek and well-fed 
men, and told them that he knew of their iniquities, 
and, cursing them, ordered the place to be closed and 
the moullahs dispersed. 

The present Amir, who has not yet the self- 
reliance of his father, treats all moullahs with great 
honour, and when he became Amir he sent for them 
all and gave them money and robes of honour, and 
otherwise treated them with distinction. It was no 
doubt politic to do so, for the time was critical ; but 
they are a rather double-edged weapon, and he may 

270 



Religion 

find that they can cut both ways should he ever 
offend them. 

There are many holy men and fakirs in the 
country, who are honoured by the people and 
treated with great consideration. They are credited 
with the power of curing sickness by reciting some 
part of the Koran over those who are ill, or by 
breathing on the water given them to drink ; but 
more usually they write a verse of the Koran on a 
piece of paper and give it to the sick person to 
swallow. Holy graves are also supposed to cast out 
sickness, simply by the person living at the grave 
until cured, and one of my servants tried this remedy 
rather than take English medicine, but died there 
on the third day. 

Lunatics are said to be God-afflicted, and no one 
therefore attempts to control their actions or in any 
way interfere with them. They are treated instead 
with great deference, and are asked for their prayers 
and advice in any difficulty or trouble. Offerings of 
food and money are taken them, and they are allowed 
to go where they will, and no one will stop them even 
if they wander into the Amir's durbar. One such, 
who was known and reverenced all over Kabul, used 
to go about with nothing on but a long shirt, and 
this was open in front and exposed the chest, and in 
the depths of winter a posteen only was worn over 
the shirt. I have seen this man on the coldest days 
lying asleep on the bare ground in the open, bare- 
headed and barefooted. The man's constitution 

271 



Under the Absolute Amir 

who can stand such privation and live must be an 
exceptional one. He used sometimes to go to the 
Government stores, which were guarded by sepoys, 
and, breaking the padlock from a door, would walk in 
and lie down there, and no one dared to interfere 
with him ; and he would also wander occasionally into 
the late Amir's durbar and give expression to his 
opinion of the Amir's character, which is a thing no 
other man could have done and lived to boast of. 
When the Amir gave him money he threw it broad- 
cast from him, and refused to be propitiated, and he 
would at times do this with the food and presents 
sent him by other people. He had many followers, 
of course, and these waxed fat on the good things 
sent their chief, and they copied his ways too, and 
tried to perfect themselves in them so that they 
might also receive honour, and perhaps, when the 
day came, step into their master's shoes, and live 
free from the trials and worries governing other 
people. 

There are many Sayids in the country ; a Sayid 
is said to be a lineal descendant of the prophet, 
and they are looked upon as people of consequence, 
and are respected by others, but this does not 
prevent them having to work for their living. 
Several worked under me, and I found them superior 
to the bulk of the men I came in contact with, and 
generally more intelligent, which was, perhaps, the 
outcome of generations of trying to be superior to 
others. 

272 



Religion 

A Hafiz is one of those who can recite the whole 
of the Koran by heart, and they are employed during 
Kamazan, the month of fasting, to recite a portion of 
it each evening in the musjids until the Koran is 
ended. It takes many days to do this, and the 
recital is so apportioned at times as to make it last 
until the end of the fast. 

The fakirs, or holy mendicants, are a great insti- 
tution in the country, as they are indeed throughout 
the East. They (men, women, and children) profess 
to do no work, but beg for the day's requirements. 
They also profess to take no heed for the morrow, and 
to make a point of keeping nothing which is given 
them for the next day, but to expend all they receive 
from the charitable the same day that they receive 
it. They may be seen on the sides of the roads and 
bazars with their wooden or copper begging bowls, 
suspended by a string round the neck and hanging in 
front of them, continuously calling out to the passers- 
by for charity. Winter and summer they sit in the 
same place all day, but in winter they have a small 
iron bowl under their posteens, in which a little 
lighted charcoal is kept in order to keep them warm. 
The present Amir is much against the mode of life of 
these people, and he has those boys whom he sees 
upon the road begging, caught and taken to the work- 
shops, where they are ordered to work, and receive food 
twice a day and clothes once a year in lieu of pay. 
They are practically kept prisoners in the workshops, 
for they are not allowed to go out day or night. So 

273 T 



Under the Absolute Amir 

far as benefit to the Government is concerned, they are 
useless, for they do nothing but play about and idle 
all day. Coercion has no effect on them, and many 
of the ustads in the shops who tried to get work out 
of them, gave them up at last as hopeless, and from 
what I saw of them, they did nothing but spoil good 
material when their masters forced them to do any- 
thing, and as they did this with even the simplest 
sort of work, it was easy to see that they hoped by 
these means to be eventually sent away as useless. 

Eeligious crimes and offences are tried by a jury of 
moullahs, under an appointed head, who is chosen from 
among themselves. For a capital religious offence 
the moullahs can order a person to be stoned to death, 
but the sentence must be ratified by the Amir. When 
the punishment is to be carried out, the condemned 
man, with hands tied behind him and chains upon 
his legs, is led along the streets of the city, some of 
the moullahs following, and at an appointed place the 
first stone is thrown by the chief moullah among them. 
The populace, who have joined the throng, and arm 
themselves with missiles as they go along, wait until 
the moullah throws the first stone, and then they 
commence throwing too. The condemned man is 
forced on by the shower of stones, which takes more 
and more effect on him as it is continued, for the 
incessant impact of stones gradually weakens him 
with pain, until a place called Siyah Sang is reached. 
This is a small hill of black rock, about two miles 
out of the city, surrounded by a stony tract of ground, 

274 



Religion 

and here larger stones are selected and thrown, so that 
soon the man is staggering forward feebly, know- 
ing that where he falls his life will be ended, and 
trying to keep on a little longer. Eventually he can 
bear no more, or a stone larger than others brings him 
to his knees and he falls full length, and then the 
hail of missiles increases, some taking small boulders 
they can barely lift and heaving them on the man's 
body, and so it continues until a mould is piled 
up over him, and there he is left, hidden by the heap 
of stones. Death does not always occur at once, 
although a man become unconscious when he falls, 
and cases have been known of a man living for some 
hours after, and dying at last in great agony. 

The people are looked after by the moullahs, who 
see that they keep to their religion, and examine 
them periodically to see if they know their prayers ; 
and for this purpose a party of them are appointed 
by the chief moullah to make occasional excursions 
into the bazars and workshops and to the public 
gardens about. On these occasions each man they 
come across is made to repeat his prayers, and if 
he says them correctly he is allowed to go his way, 
and his way is usually in the track of the moullahs, 
where he helps to swell the mob by which they 
are followed, for all those who pass the ordeal like 
to see what happens to the next man. The man 
who makes a mistake in his prayers, or has for- 
gotten part of them, is beaten with sticks ; but if 
the case is a bad one, and the man does not know 

275 



Under the Absolute Amir 

his prayers at all, or those who owe him a grudge 
come forward and testify to his not saying them 
the stipulated number of times each day, then he is 
seized, and, with his face blackened and hands tied 
behind his back, is placed backwards on a donkey, 
which is led by moullahs through the principal 
bazars of the city, with, of course, a large crowd 
of men following and making rude jokes at his 
expense. The shame and disgrace of this proceed- 
ing is said to have such a lasting effect on the man 
as to ensure the due performance of religious obser- 
vances in the future, and his friends and relations 
for years after ungenerously twit and joke him 
about it. I once saw a man, who was vigorously 
and arrogantly expressing his opinion on some sub- 
ject, interrupted quietly by one of those present to 
be asked if he knew his prayers yet ; the poor 
fellow collapsed, tried to brave it out for a little 
while, and then made a rapid exit, followed by 
the jeering laughter of his companions. Most 
of the Afghans are very susceptible to ridicule, 
and too much of it is apt to rouse their worst 
passions. 

All good Mussulmans are supposed to pray five 
times a day, but before doing so they must wash 
their hands and feet, that they shall present them- 
selves for prayer before God in a becoming manner. 
I was told that the reason wines and spirits are 
forbidden in the Koran is, that a man under the 
influence of drink does not fully comprehend what 

276 



Religion 

he does or says, and therefore his prayers, while in 
that condition, would be a sacrilege. 

The musjids in Kabul are mostly small ones, and 
are usually constructed so that three sides are enclosed 
and the fourth side left open, and they are built in 
such position that the direction of their length points 
to Mecca, in which is the tomb of the Prophet, for it 
is in the direction of Mecca that all Mussulmans face 
while saying their prayers. One very large musjid, 
called the Jumah Musjid, was built by the late Amir, 
who issued a proclamation that all those who were good 
Mussulmans must bring at least one stone from the 
mountains to be used in its construction as their share 
of the work. A large quantity of stone was collected 
in this way, but the size of the building necessitated 
the use of carts and coolies to complete the quantity 
of materials required. It is in this mosque that the 
people congregate for prayers on festivals, and twenty 
to thirty thousand are present at times, so that the 
musjid, and the grounds surrounding it, are filled 
with men standing, kneeling, and genuflecting all 
together in long rows, one behind the other. Here, 
too, they congregate for prayer when cholera or other 
calamity visits Kabul and makes a long stay, hoping 
that their united supplication will have the effect of 
averting the calamity. 

The month of Eamazan, or fast, entails fasting on 
all people from sunrise to sunset for thirty days. 
Nothing whatever must pass the lips during this 
time, and no one may take snuff or smoke. Very 

277 



Under the Absolute Amir 

young children, and those who are seriously ill, are 
exempt, but in the latter case it often happens that 
a sick person who is unable to bear the ordeal will 
insist upon fasting, and so dies from exhaustion. 
The sick person, however, who does not observe the 
fast must provide a substitute to do so, and pay the 
substitute for such service, and he must also feed 
a number of the poor according to his means, and 
a moullah must certify that the person's condition is 
such that he is, by religious law, exempt from 
fasting. After sunset until the sun rises again the 
people may eat anything they desire, and they are 
not limited to quantity. It is usual for a big gun to 
be fired at sunset as a signal to the people that the 
day's fast is over, and many of them have food or 
their pipes ready to hand, awaiting the signal which 
allows them to break their fast or take a pull at the 
pipe, for which the day's abstinence has created so 
keen a desire. An hour or so before sunrise another 
gun is fired to warn those people who have to work 
the following day that they must wake and eat while 
there is yet time to fit themselves to bear the next 
day's fast. The common practice for those who are 
able to do it is to turn night into day and sleep 
during the daytime, and eat and work at night. In 
the Government offices and factories the working 
hours are shortened, and men commence work late 
in the day and finish early. During the first part of 
the month the men seem to bear their fasting cheer- 
fully, but afterwards the effect of long abstinence 

278 



Religion 

during the day, followed by a surfeit of food begins 
to tell in the way of indigestion and dyspepsia, and 
tempers get short and quarrels become frequent. 
Many people get very ill, and not a few die, for more 
is eaten during the month of fast than any other month, 
and the people save up all they can against the time, 
when, after being deprived for hours of all they desire, 
they can at last eat, drink, and smoke to satiety, and 
a heavy meal on a stomach which has long been empty 
is not conducive to good digestion. Those who are 
heavy smokers, or in the habit of taking snuff, are 
those who feel the abstinence most, and to them the 
time seems to pass more slowly than it does to others. 
Many men have confessed to me how weary are the 
hours until the gun announces sunset, and I think all 
smokers will sympathize with them. The mirzas 
(clerks) are among those who miss their pipe and 
snuff most, for they are, almost without exception, 
inveterate smokers. The Mussulman year is reckoned 
according to the lunar months, and the month of 
fasting, therefore, comes at an earlier date each year ; 
and when it comes in the summer-time, when the 
days are long and the weather hot, thirst has to be 
added to the other discomforts, and, as almost all 
people in Kabul are in the habit of drinking water 
frequently during the day, the desire to relieve their 
thirst becomes almost unbearable, and they say it is 
the worst suffering of all during the fast. 

Six weeks following the Eid of Kamazan, the day 
of festival which concludes the month of fast, is the 

279 



Under the Absolute Amir 

great Eid-i-Kurban, or Feast of Sacrifices, and on 
this day all men, no matter how poor, see that they 
have new clothes to put on ; and should a man be so 
poor that he cannot do so, he spends the day alone 
in his house, unable to face his friends, shamed and 
miserable. It is rare, however, that a man is so 
situated, for it is the custom to make provision 
against this day, and, at the worst, old clothes can be 
mended and cleaned, and made to look good enough 
to pass muster, for it is not all who can afford to buy 
clothes first-hand. On this festival, after the prayers 
in the great musjid which the Amir and princes, 
together with their officials and the officers of the 
army attend, a review of troops is held on the large 
plain facing the mosque. The arrival of the Amir 
with his suite on the review-ground is greeted with a 
salvo of forty guns, and the review proceeds ; but as 
it simply consists of the Amir riding past all the 
regiments drawn up there, and making them a short 
speech, it is soon ended, and then the regiments are 
marched back to their barracks, while the roads en 
route are crowded with people to watch the tamasha, 
not the least of which is the passing by of the Amir 
with his retinue and bodyguard, and preceded by the 
State elephants decked with gaudy trappings. The 
people afterwards spend the day in visiting their 
friends and wishing the compliments of the season to 
each other ; and as it is customary for those visited 
to offer their guests tea and refreshments on such 
occasions, the cost of doing so is a heavy tax on most 

280 



Religion 

of them ; but it must be done if a man wishes to 
retain his respect among his fellows, even though he 
gets into debt thereby. 

On Shab-i-barat, a festival similar to our All 
Souls, fireworks in the evening are the order of the 
day, and men invite their friends to have food with 
them, and afterwards witness the firework display, 
and this is followed in the wealthier houses by music 
and dancing-girls, when the entertainment is kept up 
until a late hour at night. When a man invites 
another to dinner in the evening, it is understood 
that the guest shall stop the night, and, as it is only 
on special occasions that guests are invited, the pro- 
ceedings are always kept up until late. On the 
night of Shab-i-barat it is believed by the people 
that the souls in purgatory are visited by angels in 
order that their papers may be examined to see how 
much longer they are to stop there, and to release 
those whose time is up and take them to Paradise. 

Pilgrimages to Mecca, or the Haj, as it is called, 
are undertaken by those who are religiously inclined, 
and can afford the time and expense incurred. To 
the Afghan the Haj is a great undertaking, and the 
chances of return from so perilous a journey are 
looked upon as very small, so those who undertake 
the pilgrimage do so more or less convinced that 
they will never return, and therefore make their wills 
and settle up their affairs in the same manner as they 
would do so on the approach of death ; for foreign 
countries inhabited by enemies of their religion and 

281 



Under the Absolute Amir 

therefore of themselves have to be traversed, and 
should they get through this ordeal safely, there is 
still the sea with its storms and other perils to be 
faced. They have many queer legends of the sea 
and its inhabitants, some of which will swallow up a 
ship when they come across it ; and a man needs to 
be thoroughly infatuated with the desire to under- 
take the holy pilgrimage before he would dare face 
all the terrors and dangers which have to be en- 
countered. When, however, after safely passing 
through the perils of the journey, the pilgrim finally 
returns, entitled to the distinction of being called 
" Hadjee " for the rest of his days, his friends and 
relations make much fuss and rejoicing over his 
return, and for many months after he does little else 
but relate his travels and adventures, and the sights 
he has seen, to an eager crowd of listeners, who never 
seem to weary of hearing all that there is to be told 
them. I have heard some of them relate their ex- 
periences, and I must say their stories do not lose in 
the telling. 

The Afghans are not great travellers, for their 
rulers do not offer facilities for them to visit other 
lands, nor do they encourage strangers in the country. 
They prefer instead to keep the people isolated, and 
out of touch with the rest of the world, and are 
fearful that knowledge and enlightenment would 
lessen their hold on their subjects, who would be 
less easily swayed in the direction they wished when 
invoked in the name of their religion were they 

^282 



Religion 

conversant with the laws and customs of the people 
of other countries, and could thereby draw com- 
parisons for themselves. 

In Western Australia, however, is a small com- 
munity of Afghans who had been many years in 
the colony, and do a trade in camel transport across 
the sandy desert tracts there. One of these returned 
to Afghanistan a few years ago, bringing with him 
his English, or rather Australian, wife who had 
embraced his own religion. She was uneducated, 
and could not read or write, and from what she 
said about the visions she had, and voices she heard 
exhorting her to persevere in the practice of her 
new religion, one would imagine that her mind was 
rather unhinged. The man had returned to his own 
country, wishing to see it again after thirty years' 
absence and to be buried in the land of his fathers, 
and he brought back a small fortune with him ; but 
his relations in Kandahar had borrowed so much 
and so frequently that he had but little left, and 
for this reason he had to leave his own place and 
come to Kabul to see what the Amir would do for 
him. He lived in a very small house with but one 
servant, and his wife was allowed a small sum yearly 
from the Government, and that was all they had to 
live on. He was very grateful to me for the pipe 
and occasional presents of tobacco I gave him, and 
often lamented his want of sense in leaving Australia, 
where he had all that made life pleasant, but to 
which he was unable to return. He spoke English 

283 



Under the Absolute Amir 

like an Australian, and his language was interlarded 
with oaths which sounded queerly from the lips of 
a typical Afghan. He died some two years after 
his return from heart disease ; and the cholera, which 
broke out a few weeks later, carried off his wife 
amongst other victims, and before she died, one 
of his nephews was doing all he could to get her 
to marry him that he might share in her pension. 

The Afghan colony in Australia wrote a letter 
of congratulation to the late Amir on the occasion 
of his receiving the title of "Light of faith and 
religion," and sent him at the same time a copy 
of the Australian Government's order forbidding the 
immigration of Orientals into the country unless 
each one paid a rather heavy poll-tax, and they 
asked his help and influence with the Indian Govern- 
ment to have Afghans made exempt from this tax. 
The Amir, who always had an eye to business and 
knew that the colonists were wealthy, replied asking 
three or four of their headmen to visit him in order 
to discuss the matter ; but the headmen were loth 
to enter the lion's den, fearing, probably, that they 
might not get out of it again, and they therefore 
let the matter drop. 

Among the Afghans birds and animals are broadly 
divided into two classes, "halal" and " haram," i.e. 
those which may be eaten and which may not, and, 
generally speaking, the bird or beast which lives on 
meat or carrion is unlawful to eat. Those which are 
intended for food are killed by having the throat cut, 

284 



Religion 

and while this is being done the name of God must 
be repeated, for otherwise the flesh is haram and 
sinful to eat. If a bird is shot, the Mussulman who 
fires the gun repeats the name of God as he shoots 
so that if it is shot dead it may be made lawful 
eating. When I was out shooting myself, the men 
with me would cut the throats of any bird dropped, 
repeating meanwhile the prescribed formula, provided 
it had the faintest spark of life left in it, and so 
make it "halal," but if the bird was dead when 
picked up no one would eat it. If a dog or other 
" haram " beast touches any food with its mouth, the 
food is defiled and cannot be eaten, but if it is seen 
that the animal touches only one part of it, that 
portion may be cut away and the remainder eaten. 
Although dogs are looked upon as unclean beasts, 
they may be handled without defilement, provided 
the dog's mouth is not touched, or does not touch the 
person who is handling it ; but should the hands or 
clothes come in contact with its mouth, the part 
defiled must be washed. 

Some of the soldiers and poor people, however, 
who keep dogs and make great pets of them do not 
seem to fear defilement, and in some cases the pet 
dog sleeps on the same bed as its master, and is 
treated with every kindness. These men are fond of 
teaching their dogs to do tricks, and one pet, which 
was the property of a sepoy, would feign death, and 
beg, and walk on its hind legs, and take a handker- 
chief with a copper in it to the tobacco shop in the 

285 



Under the Absolute Amir 

bazar and bring back the tobacco, and do various 
other tricks. This dog was also trained to carry in 
its mouth a short stick, from the ends of which two 
small lanterns were suspended, and run at night to 
light the way in front of its master. 

The people repeat the name of God in all other 
things they do besides making flesh lawful. The 
workmen before commencing any work, or starting a 
new machine, or pouring molten metal into a mould, 
say the name of God that a blessing may attend the 
work and make it successful. They do the same 
before and after eating, and when naming a child, 
first they call the name of God in its ear, and then 
the one the child is to be known by. 

When the wife of an official presents him with a 
child, he takes a present of sweetmeats to the Amir 
and informs him of the fact, and then asks him to 
choose the name that is to be given it. It is 
customary for the Amir to name the children of the 
officials and those round him, excepting when a 
female child is born, for then the Queen-Sultana 
chooses the name. On the birth of a son the Amir 
gives presents to the father if he happens to be in 
favour, or if he wishes to do him honour, for the 
birth of a son is a matter for rejoicing. In the case 
of a girl, the birth is passed over in silence, for 
women are of small account in Afghanistan, and 
sometimes the father will not go near the mother for 
several days when a daughter is born, in order to 
show his displeasure and mark his resentment for the 

286 



Religion 

woman not better acting up to his desires and 
wishes. 

When one of the Amir's wives is expected to give 
birth to a child, preparations are made for the firing 
of guns and fireworks, and the feasting of all and 
sundry, in case it is a boy that comes into the world, 
but if it turns out to be a girl nothing in the way of 
rejoicing happens, and the mother is left to weep 
alone in the disappointment of her hopes ; for all 
women desire and pray for a man child, because then 
the father will visit her, and she is made much of, 
and everybody else fusses over and congratulates her, 
so that she enjoys a small triumph. 

Plurality of wives is general among the Afghans. 
There are some with one wife only ; but that is either 
because they can afford no more, or else the wife 
is decidedly the "better half," and resents the bring- 
ing of other women into the house. I have been 
told that in all harems there is a never-ending 
struggle for supremacy among the different wives, 
and that is why charms and love potions and other 
magic arts are resorted to by a woman in an en- 
deavour to concentrate the love of the man on 
herself ; and this fight for supremacy, together with 
jealousy, is one of the chief reasons why poisons 
which cannot be detected are in request. I have 
myself been asked if I knew of and could obtain a 
poison which resembled any ordinary disease in its 
effect, and once also I was asked for a charm or 
spell which would ensure one being loved, but I had 

287 



Under the Absolute Amir 

neither of these things, although I was offered a 
large amount of money for them. A West End 
witch would no doubt be able to get together a 
large clientele in Kabul and do a good business. 
The Koran is quoted as the authority for a man 
having several wives ; but there are some, and they 
claim to know the Koran, who say it is written that 
a man may marry up to four wives if he can love all 
equally, and, as this is impossible, it really means that 
one wife is ordered. The prophet is said to have 
had more than one wife ; but in his case it is stated 
that, excepting the wife he loved, they were women 
without other protection, whom he married to give a 
home to. 

All Afghans are religious fanatics, and though 
their fanaticism may not be always noticeable, it 
requires only the occasion to bring it out. Believing 
as they do that their religion has replaced Chris- 
tianity as Christianity replaced the Jewish religion, 
and that God inspires a new religion at different 
eras as the advancement of man requires it, and 
therefore their own religion, being the latest, is 
necessarily the true one, it is not a country where 
Christian missionaries would be likely to produce 
much effect. 



288 



CHAPTER XVII 

POLITICAL SITUATION 

Amir's policy in killing off leading men of country to ensure his son's 
reign Dwindling revenue Why Amir could not meet Lord Curzon 
in India Russian encroachment on frontier Russian influence in 
Kabul Afghanistan a menace to Russian approach towards India 
Afghan rule cheapest means of keeping unruly tribes in order 
Policy to keep the Afghans well armed Sympathy with English 
justice and government Influence of British Agent on the people 
Why railways are not wanted in Afghanistan Reason rich mines are 
left unworked Seaboard wanted by Amu: on Beloochistan coast 
Internal policy of Amu 1 Abdur Rahman. 

FROM the beginning of his reign, it was the policy of 
Amir Abdur Rahman to get rid in one way or another 
of those men who had much influence in the country, 
and could, by attaching to themselves a following, 
become a menace to his interests. It was not politic 
to do this openly, nor to get rid of many at one time, 
but gradually all who were likely to cause him trouble 
were disposed of. The last influential man left in the 
country was Grhulam Hyder, the commander-in -chief, 
and during the latter part of the Amir's reign he 
was often invited to Kabul, but always evaded the 
invitation on one pretext or another. He at last 
died at his post near the Indian frontier, and invidious 
remarks were made when the native doctor, who had 

289 u 



Under the Absolute Amir 

been his hakeem, and attended him in his last sick- 
ness, was sent for to Kabul, where the Amir raised 
him to the rank of colonel, and gave him money and 
presents, and generally made much of him. 

One of the Amir's methods of getting rid of those 
men who caused him any anxiety was described to me 
by one who said he had been appointed to do the 
work on several occasions. This man was not a 
Mussulman, and it was one evening, after drinking 
a good deal of my whisky, that he related his 
experiences, otherwise I doubt if he would have had 
the courage to say anything about the matter. 
Instead of mentioning the man's name I will call 
him Y. Y. said the Amir sent for him late one 
night, and asked if he knew a certain man. This 
man was of high rank, and on saying that he knew 
him, Y. was told to go to the Captain of the Guard, 
and get twelve soldiers, as was written in the order 
now given him, after which he was to go to the man's 
house and, on the pretext that the Amir wanted him 
privately on some urgent business, take him to a 
certain part of the old city which is in ruins, and 
when he got the man there he was to act according 
to instructions which were written on another paper 
the Amir gave him. Y. accordingly went to the 
man's house, taking the twelve soldiers with him, 
and leaving them outside, went to the inner gate 
and waited, as is the etiquette of the country, while 
the doorkeeper told the master of the house that 
Y. wished to see him on some urgent business. 

290 



Political Situation 

Receiving permission, he followed the servant up to 
the room where the man was sitting, together with 
several friends and relations, drinking tea. When the 
man saw Y., he called out and asked; him to come and 
sit by him, and drink tea with them. Y. did as he was 
asked, and then whispered in the man's ear that the 
Amir Sahib wanted him on some very important 
matter, and it was best that the Amir should not be 
kept waiting. The man said he would go into the 
harem and tell his family he was going out, and 
would not be back till late, but Y. told him not to 
delay even to do that, as the Amir was very urgent 
on his going at once, and soon they were outside 
together. When they got outside the gate the 
soldiers surrounded them, and the man wanted to 
know why these men came round them, but Y. told 
him that the Amir had sent a guard in his honour 
for the hour was late, so they went on, the soldiers 
walking on both sides, until they came to the bridge 
which spans the river, and here they turned to cross 
it, for the old part of the city to which Y. had been 
ordered to take the man lay in that direction. The 
man, however, got suspicious, and asked why they 
were going away from the palace, instead of towards 
it, and he seemed inclined to break away ; but the 
soldiers gathered round closer, and Y. made an 
excuse that the Amir had ordered them to go that 
way, as he did not wish others to see them going 
towards the palace, and that they were to re-cross 
the river lower down, and reach their destination 

291 



Under the Absolute Amir 

that way. The man said no more, and they went 
on, but when the road led them still further away 
from the palace he refused to go further ; but on Y. 
telling him that it was the Amir's orders, and perhaps 
seeing that it was useless to resist doing as he was 
told, he went on with them. When they at last 
arrived at a place in the ruins where there was an 
old disused well, the soldiers were signalled to seize 
the man, who, realizing what was intended, struggled 
fiercely, but was eventually overpowered, and held 
down on the ground. The officer of the men then 
came up and asked what was to be done further, so 
taking the paper given him by the Amir, Y. lighted 
a match, and after reading it told the officer that the 
man's head was to be severed from the body. The 
officer then walked back to his men, taking out his 
sword as he went, and while the man was held down, 
cut through the throat, and at last finished the job, 
but the man's violent struggles rendered it difficult 
to do what was ordered, until a gash had been made 
in the throat, and loss of blood weakened him. The 
head and body were then cast into an old well, and 
earth thrown on top to hide all traces, and they 
returned to the palace, and on arrival there Y. went 
to the Amir and reported that he had done as was 
ordered ; the Amir said, "It is good," and told him 
he had leave to go home. 

Y. said that night, after going to bed, every time 
he shut his eyes he could see the man's head as it 
was when it was at last severed from the body, and 

292 



Political Situation 

that it was several nights before he could sleep 
without starting up again thinking he saw the same 
thing. A few weeks after this had^ happened, the 
dead man's son went to the Amir, and said that Y. 
had called for his father late one night, intimating 
that the Amir Sahib wanted him, and the two of 
them had gone out together, and since then his father 
had not been seen. The Amir told him it was true, 
but to keep his mind at rest, for ; his father had been 
sent a long journey on a special mission and, God 
willing, he would come back. The relatives of men 
got rid of in this way, however, soon guessed the 
fate of those missing, and for their own sakes kept 
quiet lest they too should be taken away and never 
return. 

The Amir's object in getting rid of men who 
might cause disturbance was not only to prevent 
trouble during his own reign, but also to prepare the 
way for the peaceful accession of his son to the 
throne, and his thoroughness in carrying out all he 
did has made it very unlikely that if Ayoob Khan or 
Yakoob Khan returned to their country they could 
get together a following of sufficient numbers to 
cause any serious trouble. It was to prevent 
disturbances after his death that the Amir kept all 
his sons in Kabul, and put them in charge of various 
official departments, instead of making them governors 
of different provinces as former Amirs had done, for 
that was the cause of the fighting among the sons for 
supremacy and rule when the father died, because 

293 



Under the Absolute Amir 

each son as the governor of a province had money and 
an army to help him in a struggle for the throne, 
and as each brother wanted it a good deal of fighting 
always ensued, and caused much bloodshed and misery 
in the country from time to time. 

The history of Afghanistan shows how brother 
fought brother, and sons their father, one killing or 
blinding the other in a fierce desire to rule supreme, 
and the foresight of the Amir prevented a repetition 
of these horrors on his death. When that occurred 
there was no one but Sirdar Habibullah who had any 
chance as a candidate for the throne, and having 
been the head Sirdar for many years, and having 
also represented his father, who was seldom in good 
health, on many official occasions, he was looked upon 
by the leading men of the country as the one to 
succeed to the throne, and consequently received their 
support. This, together with his immediate occupa- 
tion of the fortified palace of Arak, whereby he 
gained control of the treasury and the stores of 
modern arms and ammunition as soon as his father 
was dead, made him master of the situation, and there 
was no one likely to give him trouble except the 
Queen-Sultana, the mother of his half-brother, 
Mahomed Omar Khan, who was then about twelve 
years of age, and she was at once shut out of Arak, 
where she usually occupied the harem-serai built for 
the use of the Amir's chief wife, and had to live in 
her private palace, Gulistan serai, which is situated 
on the Deh Afghanan side of the city. Here she 

294 



Political Situation 

was kept nominally in great honour as the chief wife 
of the late Amir, but practically a prisoner, for all 
her chief and confidential servants were taken from 
her and others in the Amir's pay sent in place of 
them, and no one was allowed to go and see her, 
while all entrances to her palace, excepting the 
principal gate, were bricked up. The Amir and 
Sirdar Nasrullah Khan were particularly urgent in 
their orders to Mrs. Daly, the lady doctor in Kabul, 
that she should not visit the Queen-Sultana or hold 
communication with her, and they apparently feared 
that she might be induced to take or send a letter 
from the queen to the Indian Government, asking 
for aid in placing her own son on the throne ; and, 
though the Indian Government might not take any 
notice of her letter, yet such action might prejudice 
the new Amir in their eyes. Also those officials and 
army officers who were possessed of any influence, and 
were inclined to side with the Queen-Sultana, were 
bought over by the new Amir, and were raised to 
higher rank. 

The army, however, was seething with discontent, 
and a rising was feared and indeed imminent ; but a 
promise, which was afterwards ratified, of an increase 
of pay all round kept them from any open act of 
insubordination, although there was a good deal of 
muttering for a long time, and the soldiers freely 
expressed their opinions and said they wanted 
any other government but that of the reigning 
family. The want of reliance in the Government 

295 



Under the Absolute Amir 

among the people was shown by open acts of robbery 
with violence in different parts of the country, the 
like of which had been unknown for many years, and 
it expressed the indifference of the people to the 
constituted authority. This want of reliance in, or 
objection to, the existing Government was further 
shown by the attacks on the Europeans resident in 
the country, one of whom was shot from behind and 
killed by the officer of his escort for a slight so trivial 
as to induce a doubt as to whether the man acted 
entirely on his own initiative, or had been prompted 
by those who hoped thereby to cause complica- 
tions with other powers prejudicial to their own 
Government. 

At the time I left Kabul, the revenue of the 
country was barely sufficient to pay for the army, 
and it has been for many years gradually dwindling 
in amount, and the Amir was in great need of 
money. Also no arrangement had been come to 
with the Indian Government regarding the continu- 
ance of the subsidy which was paid the former Amir, 
and the present ruler, for fear of refusal, dared not 
ask for it prior to arrangements being made for the 
continuance with himself of the terms of alliance 
made with his father. Lord Curzon was insistent in 
his requests for the Amir to visit him in Peshawar, 
in order to settle all matters in a personal interview ; 
but with the people in a state of unrest, and so many 
matters of importance to the internal government of 
the country requiring immediate settlement and 

296 



Political Situation 

action, the danger of leaving Kabul at that time was 
too great for the Amir to risk. The Russian Govern- 
ment offered to present him with many field-guns, 
rifles, and ammunition, but the offer was declined, 
for the Russians are feared and distrusted, and their 
encroachment on Afghan territory is greatly resented. 
Some of the officials, however, appeared to be in 
favour of Russian help, for they said that if the 
English Government did not help the country there 
were others who would, and there were those who 
endeavoured to persuade the Amir into accepting 
Russian help. 

About this time an Afghan general came in from 
the Russian frontier, and it was generally said that he 
brought with him two Russians, dressed like Afghan 
slave boys, of high family. Nothing was definitely 
known of this ; but at the time it was said that these 
Russians were in Kabul, the Amir went to stop a 
week or two at his summer palace at Hindeki, some 
six miles south of the city, taking with him none but 
a few trusted officials and friends, and it was 
peremptorily ordered that while there he was to be 
left undisturbed, and no one but those who were sent 
for were to go to him. This general afterwards 
changed a large amount of Russian money in the 
city, and from that time Russian notes could be 
bought in the bazar, and as it was the first time since 
his accession to the throne that the Amir had stayed 
at Hindeki, or any other place except in the Arak 
stronghold, and as nothing definite was publicly 

297 



Under the Absolute Amir 

known of what transpired, or indeed anything at all 
of what the Amir did while he was at Hindeki, it 
was all very unusual, for all that the Amir does, 
except when in his harem, is commonly known and 
discussed, and a good deal is known of what he 
does there. 

It will be seen that the Amir's position for some 
time after his succession was a difficult one, and 
there care still many elements of danger to be over- 
come. He has neither the experience nor self-reliance 
of his father, and what he may do in a critical time, 
or how he would emerge from the test of danger and 
adversity, cannot be forecast ; but as the ingredients 
which go towards the making of anarchy and rebellion 
are not wanting in the country, time will probably 
give the answer. 

Afghanistan is frequently described as a buffer 
state between India and Kussia, but it is a buffer 
which the rolling forward of either power would 
readily crush. The bulk of the people are in a dis- 
contented condition, for with high taxation driving 
them from their lands to seek work as coolies, food 
yearly growing dearer, and epidemics common, it is 
likely enough that they would welcome any change 
as a change for the better, and until the Amir has 
a grasp on the people equal to that of his father, 
an invading power would not have an altogether 
combined Afghanistan to contend against, in spite 
of the Amir's widely distributed pamphlets on Jihad. 

The Amir, and those with him, rely a good deal 
298 



Political Situation 

on Jihad (religious war), which is to be preached 
by the mullahs in case an invading army crosses 
the frontier, and pamphlets on the subject have 
been printed and distributed all over the country. 
But as matters now stand, the people, although 
extremely fanatical, can hardly be relied on to fight 
very vigorously, or for any length of time. The 
army is supplied with modern field-guns, rifles, and 
ammunition, but, although of a modern pattern, 
they are few in number, and are not equal to those 
of other countries in range and accuracy. The army 
is also wholly untrained as compared with the troops 
of the two great powers on either side of them, and 
its officers have no more knowledge of modern war- 
fare than the rank-and-file. It is only in the 
natural difficulties offered by the mountainous de- 
scription of country to the effective movement of 
troops and transport of heavy guns that the Amir 
could hope to offer any serious opposition to an 
invading army, and it is unlikely that after the 
first stand made against the invader they would 
risk further battle. They would be more likely to 
resort to the guerilla methods common to them, 
cutting up small detachments and harassing the 
rear and lines of communication ; but the larger 
the invading army, the less effective would these 
methods be. 

As a means of keeping unruly tribes in order, 
the Afghans are best left to govern themselves. 
Their methods of quelling rebellion and disorder are 

299 



Under the Absolute Amir 

more ruthless, and therefore more effective and last- 
ing, for the description of people dealt with than 
are the humane methods of other people. Amir 
Abdur Kahman, after killing off the bulk of a 
nation (men, women, and children) for rebelling 
against his authority, has had the remainder trans- 
ported to a distant part of the country, where, rid 
of former associations and by intermarriage with 
other people, they have lost their old traditions, 
and settled down quietly to the new order of things. 
Should the English (or other power) occupy the 
country, the cost of an army of occupation, which 
would be necessary to keep the people in order, 
would probably equal that of the Indian army, 
until a new generation had grown up, more adaptable 
and willing to accept the altered condition of affairs. 

If it was intended that the Afghans should be 
used as a means of checking Kussian aggression, it 
would no doubt be better that they were well 
supplied with the best modern arms ; but on the 
other hand, there is always the chance of such arms 
being used against the English, for the Afghans 
look upon all who are not of their own country and 
religion as enemies, and it is unlikely that any 
existing treaty would be considered or have the effect 
of making them hesitate to take advantage of an 
occasion which gave them an opportunity for ex- 
tending their country, or of benefiting themselves 
otherwise. When the border tribes rose and necessi- 
tated the Tirah campaign, the late Amir had some 

300 



Political Situation 

thousands of transport animals collected near Kabul, 
at the back of the mountains, and though a rising 
on his frontier no doubt necessitated precautionary 
measures in case his own interests were menaced, 
yet, had the British been driven beyond the Indus 
as was expected, and which was reported in the 
bazars as accomplished shortly after the rising 
started, the temptation to retake the Peshawar 
district would perhaps have been a powerful one, 
for that district is always claimed as part of the 
Afghan territory which was stolen from them by 
the British. 

Generally the sympathies of the people lie to- 
wards the justice and equality of the British rule, 
and this is due mostly to the stories related of the 
freedom of life in India by the people who have 
lived there; but the authorities deal severely with 
those who show a liking for the English, and as 
they fear to let any information of their doings 
reach the British Government, a spy truly or falsely 
convicted of reporting to the English is an offender, 
who is summarily and finally dealt with. 

The British agent in Kabul, and those with him, 
are little better than prisoners, for they see no one, 
and cannot themselves mix with the people, and 
have to confine their peregrinations to the boundaries 
of Kabul. All who are found visiting the British 
agent are imprisoned, and many hundreds have been 
killed merely on suspicion of giving him reports of 
the doings of the Government ; and an Afghan spy, 

301 



Under the Absolute Amir 

ostensibly doing a trade as a tea-seller, is stationed 
on the road opposite the gate of the agent's house 
(the house lies a little back from the road) for the 
purpose of noting those who go there, and if any 
man passes even within a few yards of the gate, he 
is reported to the Kotwal ; but the fear of the people 
of being seen anywhere near the house is now such 
that all give it a wide berth in passing by, and no 
man who values his life would dare to be seen talking 
to any of the agent's men whom he met in the bazar. 

All this would seem to point to a good deal 
happening which is detrimental to the interests of 
the British Government which the Afghan ruler fears 
may come to their knowledge, but from what I saw 
and heard in the country, it is only occasionally that 
anything happens which would interest the Indian 
Government, and then only mildly. It may be, 
however, to prevent news of these occasional happen- 
ings leaking out that the Afghan rulers consider it 
necessary to make the people afraid of giving news 
of any sort to the enemies of their country ; for so 
they look upon all those who are not of themselves. 

They certainly have occasion to fear their prison 
system becoming known publicly, for cruelty of all 
sorts is common in the way of torture. Imagine 
a prison where the limbs which have been hacked 
off men are left lying about, together with the dis- 
membered bodies of those dead, of the suffering 
inflicted on them, until the whole place reeks of 
decomposing flesh, and then consider the frame of 

302 



Political Situation 

mind of hundreds who are imprisoned without trial, 
unknowing of what their own punishment is to be, 
who daily live in the midst of these horrors. If 
the truth about the Kabul prisons were generally 
known, other countries would probably unite in 
insisting on such barbarity being stopped. 

The common people, who have their own way of 
looking at everything, attribute the large numbers of 
men killed in prison without any generally known 
reason for their execution to the British Government, 
and say that as the British were unable to conquer 
them by fighting, they now pay the Amir large sums of 
money monthly (the subsidy) to kill them in other 
ways. The people also say of the Bala Hisar (high 
fort) in Kabul, which Lord Koberts rased to the 
ground in 1880 after the massacre of Cavagnari and 
his men, and which still remains in ruins, that the 
Amir has been ordered by the British Government 
not to rebuild it, as one of the conditions of his 
occupying the throne. The opinion of these people, 
however fallacious, is still the opinion of those who 
comprise the bulk of the population, and although 
they are ignorant and uninformed their opinion ought 
not to be altogether neglected. 

Amir Abdur Eahman, on one of the occasions 
when he favoured me with remarks on political 
affairs, told me he had received a letter from one 
of his spies in Russia, and he would read it to me. 
His object in doing so, of course, was not that he 
wished me to keep the information to myself, but 

303 



Under the Absolute Amir 

I was leaving for India the following day, and it was 
a matter the Amir could not very well make the 
occasion of a letter to the Indian Government. The 
spy wrote that he had it from a Russian official in 
high authority that his Government intended, so long 
as Amir Abdur Rahman lived, to leave Afghanistan 
untouched, but that after his death they would seize 
it ; and when the Amir had read this to me he 
remarked that if it was true that such was their 
intention, although he would be dead when they 
endeavoured to take his country, it was, nevertheless, 
a matter of importance to him, for he had for many 
years been striving to unite and raise his country to 
such position that it could hold its own among the 
nations and remain always an independent kingdom, 
and if at the time of his death his object might not 
be altogether accomplished, still, what he had done 
would form a foundation on which it was his greatest 
desire that his sons and their descendants would build 
the wall which was to keep the country intact and 
prevent foreign aggression 

On all occasions when Amir Abdur Rahman spoke 
to me on such matters he showed that he had the 
good of his country at heart, and at times he even 
shed tears when he reflected on his failure to imbue 
the whole of his people with his ambitions, and that 
all his efforts, even punishing and killing to the 
extent he had done, failed to induce them to forego 
those habits which prevented the union and strength 
he prayed for. 

304 



Political Situation 

On the occasion mentioned above, the Amir 
threw some light on his aversion to having railways 
in Afghanistan. He said he had powerful neigh- 
bours on both sides of him. Each power was anxious 
to extend their railways into his country, and, failing 
that, they were always trying to persuade him to 
construct them himself for the benefit and improve- 
ment of his people. But supposing he did as they 
wanted and laid railways over his country, then they 
would point out that unless his system communicated 
with theirs they would be of little advantage to him, 
and he himself could see that too. And then if he 
joined up his railways with one power, the other 
power would claim a like concession and he would 
have to give it to risk friction and war, and yet 
England as his ally would expect to be the only one 
so favoured. Therefore, he said, it is better that the 
country should go without railways, however much 
it loses in its trade and development by so doing. 

Amir Abdur Rahman never favoured me with 
any remarks which would throw a light on his 
apparently culpable neglect in working the rich mines 
of his country. Instead, he often mentioned the benefit 
to his country which the working of these mines 
would occasion, and soon after my appointment he 
gave me written orders to build the necessary works 
for smelting the copper ores which have been found 
in the neighbourhood of Kabul. When the work 
was about half completed, however, he sent instruc- 
tions to me to postpone work on it until further 

305 x 



Under the Absolute Amir 

orders, and thereafter let the matter rest in abeyance, 
so that the work still remains uncompleted. He 
avoided any mention to me of his reason for stopping 
a work on which he had been so keen to begin, and 
it can only be supposed that he was fearful of adding 
an incentive to interference with his country on the part 
of his neighbours by showing the riches it contained. 

Amir Habibullah, who follows his father's policy 
in all things, has done nothing towards developing 
the resources of the country beyond ascertaining the 
position and value of its various mineral deposits. 
Amir Habibullah is, however, desirous of obtaining a 
strip of country from the west of Afghanistan to the 
coast on the Beloochistan side, in order to obtain a 
seaboard which would enable him to deal direct with 
other countries and obviate the necessity of going 
through the territories of his neighbours permission 
for which depends always on their goodwill. With 
such a seaboard they would be independent, could 
develop the country, and sell the produce of their 
mines and other exports direct, and with the pro- 
ceeds of such trade could import whatever war 
material or other goods they required, and strengthen 
themselves without the knowledge of or interference 
from their neighbours. 

The Afghan rulers have spies and others in India 
as well as in European countries who give them in- 
formation on all subjects which affect Afghanistan 
either directly or indirectly, and the Amir and his 
intimates take the utmost interest in the doings of 

306 



Political Situation 

those who rule the destinies of other nations, and 
they watch all that goes on between the different 
powers. But, excepting these few in authority, the 
people are shut off from news of the outer world, for 
there are no newspapers in the country, and the 
newspapers of other countries they are unable to 
read ; and as their Government objects to foreigners 
entering the country and allows none such to do so ex- 
cept on business, and then only by special permission 
from the Amir, and as very few of their own people are 
allowed to travel on business across the border, the 
bulk of the Afghans are ignorant of everything except 
that which happens within their own limited sphere. 
The Afghan rulers also in their conduct of the 
internal affairs of the country make a point of keep- 
ing it secluded and out of touch with the other 
countries around them, and British officers who have 
crossed the border either knowingly or otherwise, 
have been made prisoners and kept so until the 
Amir's orders were received. The intercourse of the 
people with other nations would no doubt tend to 
civilize them, and by broadening their views do 
away with much of their present fanatical prejudice 
against all other people, which is due principally to 
the secluded life they are forced to lead, practically 
cut off from the rest of the world. It is this thought 
which directs the policy of seclusion of their rulers, 
for they make a practice of working upon the ignor- 
ance and religious superstition of the people to 
influence them in any required direction. 

307 



CHAPTER XVIII 

ROAD FROM KABUL TO PESHAWAR 

Difficulty of getting permission to enter Afghanistan and to leave it 
Description of country passed through Camping-places on way down 
and distances Description of Jelalabad city Usbeg horseback game 
of Buz-bazee Kabul river at Jelalabad and beyond The musak 
Summer heat The last day's journey. 

AFTER several years spent in Kabul, one experiences a 
sense of elation when the time comes for leaving it. 
The thought of being back soon in civilization, among 
one's friends and the people of one's own country, 
produces so keen a desire to be with them again at 
once that the time occupied in making ready to start, 
and that spent on the journey, seems interminable. 
When in Kabul there is a remoteness in the thought 
of home and England so great that the memory 
seems to deal with the land and people of another 
planet, and if one were a Buddhist it might easily be 
conceived that the memory dealt with a former in- 
carnation, for one is so cut off from the outer world, 
and all things are so different, that it appears like a 
separate existence. 

Afghanistan is a difficult country to get into, for 
not only is the Amir's written permission necessary, 
but the Indian Government must consent also, for no 

308 



Road from Kabul to Peshawar 

European is allowed to go through the Kbyber Pass 
and cross the frontier without a permit, and that is 
only granted on producing the Amir's firman ; and 
even then one is not allowed to start until the 
Afghans across the frontier have been communicated 
with and the escort arranged to meet the traveller on 
a certain day. It is also difficult to leave it, for the 
Amir is chary of giving leave to those who have 
spent some time in the country. I was there for over 
eight years without a break, and although I repeatedly 
asked for leave I was always put off on one pretext or 
another. When permission to leave has been given 
there always occurs another two or three weeks' delay 
in getting together the pack-horses required for carry- 
ing luggage, and the escort of sowars (cavalry) 
necessary for protection on the journey, and the tents 
and carpets, etc. With a desire to start as soon as 
ever possible, the casual to-morrow-or-next-day habit 
of the people, to which one has got accustomed more 
or less, becomes of a sudden a prominent characteristic, 
and proportionately irritating. But as all things 
come to those who wait, provided they wait long 
enough, everything is at last ready, and one morning 
all the boxes and packages are fastened on the backs 
of the pack-animals, the servants are seated on those 
horses which carry the lightest loads, and the baggage 
is got off, and an hour or two later one mounts and 
starts off one's self. 

It is an eight days' journey from Kabul to 
Peshawar if long marches are undertaken each day, 

309 



Under the Absolute Amir 

but the people who travel up and down that way 
usually take eleven or twelve days. I have done 
it in six days, but to do it in this time all the 
riding and pack-horses must be of the best, for the 
mountainous country traversed, and rough stony 
character of the tracks (there are no roads excepting 
round Kabul itself), make it very trying for the 
horses, and on a very long day's march some will 
drop from fatigue, and cases of horses dying on 
the road are not at all uncommon. 

When the valley of Kabul has been left behind 
the country appears very desolate, for there is nothing 
but mountains, rocks, and sand to be seen. The 
second day's journey takes one over the Latabund 
Pass which lies at a considerable altitude above 
Kabul, which is itself seven thousand feet above 
sea-level, and the rest of the journey until Jelalabad 
is reached is all over mountains. Camp for the 
night is pitched near small villages set in valleys 
where a little water makes the cultivation of a few 
patches of sandy soil possible. It is the very small 
amount of rainfall which makes the country so barren 
generally for the disintegrated rock which collects 
in the valleys, and the foot of the mountains forms 
a prolific soil when it can be irrigated, and it is 
also the want of verdure and trees on the mountains, 
and absence of clouds with their accompanying haze 
of moisture, which is the cause of the monotonous 
colouring of the landscape, for there are many fine 
mountain scenes which would be magnificent, but 

310 



Road from Kabul to Peshawar 

for the dry ness of the atmosphere which makes the 
hills and mountains, far and near, shades of one 
dirty looking colour. At the beginning of a day's 
march, the sameness of the prospect makes one almost 
sigh at the dreary stretch of country to be ridden 
over, for it offers nothing of interest to lessen the 
sense of fatigue, and the only desire while riding 
is to get it done with, and look forward to the 
camping-place. 

The usual stopping-places between Kabul and 
Jelalabad, which is about halfway to Peshawar, are 
Budkhark, twelve miles ; Barikab, thirty-two miles ; 
Jagdalak, sixteen miles ; Gandamak, twenty- eight 
miles ; Fatehabad, eighteen miles ; and Jelalabad, 
nineteen miles. These distances are only approximate, 
for they are estimated from the time occupied in 
riding from one to the other. There are other places 
at which one may camp for the night if necessary, 
according to the number of days in which it is 
desired to make the journey ; but the above are best 
if one wishes to make each day's journey equal in 
fatigue for the horses and pack-animals. The shorter 
marches are over bad mountain tracts, which tire the 
horses quite as much as a longer journey over fairly 
level country. The sixth day's journey to Jelalabad 
is over ground which slopes down gradually from 
the foot hills, but almost the whole of it is through 
sand mixed with small stones in which the horses 
feet sink deeply, and makes the going hard and 
tiring. Those who have walked any distance in dry 

3" 



Under the Absolute Amir 

sand by the seashore will appreciate the fatigue of 
the horses in getting over such country. 

When I left Kabul snow was falling, and had 
been doing so for the past two days, and the 
mountains and plains were covered with it, and to 
make matters worse a blizzard was blowing. The 
coldness of a blizzard must be experienced to be 
appreciated, and I heard afterwards that two or three 
soldiers on night-guard had been frozen to death ; but 
this is a common occurrence during the severe winters 
experienced in Kabul, when the wind gains in piercing 
intensity as the cold increases during the night. 

After riding through the snow for some hours, 
with limbs stiffened and senses benumbed by the 
icy wind, it was with a feeling of thankfulness that 
I saw the walls of the serai, showing through the 
driving snow ; and when we reached the place and 
dismounted, I found that the circulation in my right 
hand had stopped, and it was only after having it 
rubbed for some time that it got right again. The 
serais, which are stationed at intervals along the 
route, are intended for the use of the caravans, and 
they are made in the form of a square, with a high 
wall surrounding it, and the rooms are built against 
the inner side of the wall. There is a verandah out- 
side the rooms, under which the packages carried by 
the caravans are stored for the night in bad weather, 
and which also forms a shelter for the camels and 
pack-animals. Over the gate of the serai, in which 
we lodged for the first night, was an upper room, 

312 



Road from Kabul to Peshawar 

built for the use of travellers of position and standing, 
and this was placed at my disposal ; but as regards 
its comforts, I can only say that it was better than 
being outside. One of the lower rooms which are 
used by the men of the caravans travelling up and 
down would have been warmer, but they are filthy, 
and mostly contain a vigorous population undesirable 
to those of clean habits ; and the room I occupied 
was fairly clean, but it was unfurnished, and had 
no fireplace, while the window was composed of 
wooden shutters, and round the frame were cracks 
an inch wide, where the wood had shrunk away from 
the wall and left open spaces, and in the wall itself 
were large cracks, due probably to earthquakes, 
through which the wind whistled ; so while waiting 
for the baggage to come up, I had an open fire 
lighted on the top of the verandah outside, and 
warmed myself one side at a time. It was not until 
night had fallen that the baggage animals came in, 
and I was able to get a cup of hot tea, and an hour 
or two later I got some food, and it was rather a 
dreary time waiting for it, when tired and hungry, 
and the thermometer below zero. To undress and 
go to sleep with the blizzard blowing in at all the 
cracks in wall and window was not to be thought 
of, so I took off my boots only and lay down, 
covering myself with all the rugs I had ; and in the 
morning when I woke, I found that the water in 
the wash-basin was frozen solid, and fine drift snow 
covered the floor and bed. 

313 



Under the Absolute Amir 

The morning was clear and bright, and the 
dazzling whiteness of the snow in the sunlight was 
blinding, until the eyes became a little used to it ; 
but the wind continued in all its severity, and while 
riding over the Latabund Pass, we found it far too 
cold at that altitude to sit in the saddle with 
comfort, for our hands and feet became so numbed 
and useless that we feared frostbite, and therefore 
the escort and myself dismounted and walked, in 
order to keep ourselves warm, and led our horses, 
until about two o'clock in the afternoon, we reached 
the summit. Once on the other side of the pass, 
we were protected from the wind, but I thought 
it still too cold to ride, and so walked on the rest 
of the way to Barikab, where I reached camp at 
six in the evening, very tired with a long day's 
walk. The pack animals, which are too heavily laden 
to take the short cuts over the mountains that 
the riding horses follow, did not reach camp until 
nine o'clock, so that it was again very late before 
I got my dinner, and by the time I got it I 
wanted it. 

Thence to Jelalabad, as each successive range of 
mountains brought us still lower down it got warmer 
day by day, but the warmth was comparative only, 
for it was still very cold when we reached Jelalabad. 
Here I spent a day, having a day extra in hand 
in which to reach the Khyber Pass, which is open 
for travellers twice a week only, and occupied my- 
self in looking over the city and inspecting the 

3'4 



Road from Kabul to Peshawar 

Aniir's palace and gardens there. The city is a 
small one, and is walled round, as usual, but the 
wall is broken down in places, and everything has 
a most dilapidated look, and many parts are in 
ruins. There is no attempt to keep the city clean, 
and the inhabitants of each house make their own 
sanitary arrangements, which practically means none 
at all, as each one throws the refuse of the house 
outside to lie there and rot, if not eaten up by the 
dogs and crows. The water of the place stinks, 
and it is not at all surprising that when cholera 
visits it, being brought up from India with the 
caravans, it makes a long and effective stay. One 
wonders that it does not wipe off the whole of the 
population, but the dry climate and frequent winds, 
no doubt, help towards the sanitary condition of 
the city, and perhaps long-continued successive visits 
of cholera have made many of the people immune. 

It was in Jelalabad that I first saw the Usbeg 
game of " Buz-bazee " (literally, " goat play "). It is 
played on horseback, and the first thing done is to 
kill a goat or sheep by cutting its throat in the usual 
manner while the Usbeg horsemen gather around. 
When this has been done, a signal is given, and all 
the riders make a dash at the carcase, which lies on 
the ground. The man who gets it flings it across the 
saddle in front of him, and goes off at full gallop, 
the others chasing him until one or another catches 
him up, and then ensues a struggle, while still at 
full gallop, for the possession of the body. The man 

315 



Under the Absolute Amir 

who gets it is chased in turn by the others, and 
when the carcase falls to the ground, as it does at 
times, it is picked up as the rider gallops by, the 
horseman riding with one leg and arm thrown over 
the horse to enable him to reach low down to the 
ground. So the game goes on until the limbs are 
wrenched apart and the victors ride off at last with 
the portion they have been able to secure, and which 
the speed and agility of their horses prevents others 
from taking from them. 

The usual journey from Jelalabad to Peshawar 
occupies five days. Girdi Kutch, the first stopping- 
place, is twenty miles ; Basawal, eighteen miles ; 
Daka, the Afghan frontier post, sixteen miles ; and 
Lundi Kotal, the British frontier post on the far side 
of the Khyber Pass, twenty miles. The last day's 
journey is from Lundi Kotal through the Khyber 
Pass, and past Jumrood, the fort which guards the 
mouth of the Khyber on the Indian side, and on 
into Peshawar, where one enters once more into 
civilization. 

From Jelalabad to the Khyber mountains the 
country is a comparatively flat one, and for the 
greater part of the journey the route follows 
the course of the Kabul river, which is here broad 
and shallow, though the current is swift, on account 
of the considerable fall in level between Jelalabad 
and Peshawar. This portion of the river contains 
several whirlpools, which render navigation a matter 
of difficulty and danger to all who are not well 

316 



Road from Kabul to Peshawar 

conversant with the currents. The whirlpools are 
said to be mostly situated in the narrow gorges of 
the Khyber mountains, through which the river flows, 
and that it is here where the skill of the raftsmen 
is called into play to prevent sudden disaster, for 
the swiftness of the current gives little opportunity 
of correcting a mistake in steering. 

Jelalabad is one of the few spots in Afghanistan 
where there are many trees. The forests are situated 
some few miles from the city, and may be seen 
covering some of the hills in the distance. The 
timber, a description of the pine tree, after being 
cut down, is roughly squared into logs and dragged 
down to the river, where they are formed into rafts 
and floated down into Peshawar for sale. A small 
amount of produce is also carried on the rafts and 
sold in India. 

On one of my journeys down to Peshawar the 
governor of Jelalabad, by order of the Amir, sent me 
several large melons which are grown in the district. 
The size of the melons was so great, about two feet 
long and one and a half feet in diameter, that I had 
no means of carrying them with me, and on this being 
represented to the governor, he gave instructions for 
them to be carried by raft into Peshawar and handed 
over to me there. The raftsmen told me that they 
would be in Peshawar twelve hours after leaving 
Jelalabad, and as the distance between the two points 
is about a hundred miles, some idea of the speed of 
the current may be gained. 

317 



Under the Absolute Amir 

\ 

The water of the river is fed by the melted snow 

from the mountains, and is intensely cold, and I was 
told that any one who attempted to swim across the 
river would be carried so far down by the current 
before reaching the other side that the coldness of the 
water would make him numbed and powerless, and he 
would drown. The people of the district, when they 
have to cross the river, do so on musaks distended 
with air, which keep the body clear of the water, 
while allowing the use of the legs and arms as a 
means of propulsion ; but even then the limbs get so 
numbed and paralyzed that only strong men can make 
use of the musak as a means of crossing the river, or 
floating down to another village some miles lower on 
the same side ; and I was told that the frequent use 
of it brings on rheumatism in the legs and arms and 
one can quite understand that it would do so. 

The musak is the same as that used by watermen 
all over the East for carrying water. It is made of a 
goat i or sheepskin, which is treated to make the skin soft 
and flexible, and afterwards sown up, so that it has 
the original form of the animal, minus head and legs ; 
the joints are made watertight, and the whole skin 
when distended by air being blown into it forms a 
very buoyant vessel. The villager lies face down- 
wards on it, and pushing off into deep water, strikes 
out with arms and legs, much as if he was swimming, 
and those I have seen travelling down the river in 
this way were going at a speed which I estimated at 
a good ten miles an hour. 

318 



Road from Kabul to Peshawar 

Close to Jelalabad, where the river narrows as it 
runs between some low hills, the villagers have 
stretched a thick rope across from bank to bank, 
fastening it to large iron bars fixed in the rocks at 
the side, and by means of this rope they ferry a 
rickety -looking raft, which is built up of frail-looking 
poles roughly tied together, and supported on musaks, 
from one bank to the other, and carry freight, 
passengers, and animals as required. The rope is a 
country-made one of unequal thickness, and ragged 
with loose strands, and has a good deal of stress 
thrown on it by the swift current which surges 
against the raft, and swings it from side to side on 
its passage, and it struck me that a passenger addicted 
to nerves would find the crossing a rather trying time. 
I was not surprised to learn that the raft occasionally 
broke away with disastrous results to those on it, for 
few of the people can swim. 

The people of the district once petitioned the Amir 
to make a bridge over the river, and to ensure the 
free communication which would benefit the people 
on both sides, a bridge is badly wanted. The Amir, 
who was averse to making any fixed structure 
which might benefit some future enemy, decided on 
having a pontoon bridge made ; but the men he put in 
charge of the work being altogether inexperienced, 
their efforts were made short work of by the river, 
and the idea was abandoned. 

I once suggested a scheme to the Amir of taking 
advantage of the river for carrying freight between 

319 



Under the Absolute Amir 

the Jelalabad district and India, and such a scheme is 
quite feasible ; for, by cutting a deep channel in the 
wider portions of the river, and blasting away the 
rocks which cause the whirlpools and other dangers to 
navigation, the journey down to India could be made 
easy, and steam tugs could be employed for drawing 
barges up on the return journey. At present pack- 
animals are used, and the cost of freight every year 
is a large item to the Government, and for several 
months in the year the heat of the lower country 
between Jelalabad and the Khyber, and consequent 
high death-rate among the pack-animals, prohibits 
the carriage of anything but very necessary articles, 
which must be brought up at all costs. The Amir 
was at first disposed to have the scheme gone into, 
but eventually he let the matter drop, as he did 
all schemes which did not offer immediate reim- 
bursement. 

The country between Jelalabad and the Khyber 
is well cultivated, and there are many villages on 
both sides of the river ; but a good deal of ground is 
allowed to lie idle which could be made profitable, 
and the reason for this is, no doubt, that there are 
no cheap means of carrying produce for sale in India, 
and the people have no incentive to grow more than 
is sufficient for their own consumption. The soil is 
very productive, and most of the cereals, fruits, etc., 
suitable for a hot climate, grow well. The heat 
during the summer months is great, though not so 
much so as in the Peshawar district. It is, however, 

320 



Road from Kabul to Peshawar 

quite hot enough to render riding over that part of 
the country a very trying experience ; and I re- 
member when travelling up once in June how my 
mouth became so parched that I dare not let my 
tongue touch the roof of the mouth, as I was afraid 
it would stick there and choke me, and I was ready 
to drink from any of the stinking wells we came to, 
to get relief. Fortunately there was no cholera 
about at the time, or I might have fared worse, for 
no thought of disease would have deterred me from 
drinking. The temperature is made more trying than 
it would be because the rocks absorb the heat of the 
sun and become very hot, and the heat given out by 
them, together with that of the sun, makes the narrow 
defiles here and there feel like ovens, and they are so 
stifling that breathing more resembles gasping, until 
they are left behind, when the hot wind of the plains 
comes as a perfect relief after what has been gone 
through. " Like unto the shadow of a great rock in 
a dry land " has a fuller meaning to those who travel 
in such places. 

The route from Kabul to Peshawar is the shortest 
and the recognized one for those who travel to 
India. There are other roads which might be used to 
get there ; but even if one had the opportunity of 
using them, there are few who would care to prolong 
the time spent on the journey by electing to travel 
that way. 

When the last day's journey through Afghan 
territory brings one at last to the point where 

321 Y 



Under the Absolute Amir 

British territory begins, the line of demarcation is 
readily defined. Up to the point where the Afghan 
rule extends, one travels over the country as Nature 
made it, and the way is strewn with rocks and 
boulders, which are allowed to lie in the path, and 
necessitate the horses walking round, or in and out 
between them, and making them traverse thereby a 
much longer distance than a clear road would give. 
But from that point where British authority begins, 
there is a smooth graded road, which leads one high 
up over the hills and mountains of the Khyber to 
Lundi Kotal, and thence through the difficult 
mountain country of the Pass, and on into Peshawar, 
with gradients so easy that one can take a dog-cart 
and drive at a sharp trot the whole of the distance, 
and cover ground in a few hours which, on the 
Afghan side of the frontier, takes a long day's tedious 
riding to get over. 



322 



INDEX 



Abdur Rahman, Amir 

Admiration for Gladstone, Bis- 
marck, MacMahon, and General 
White, 118-119 

Afghans in Australia, and, 284 

Amusements, 105-108 

Anecdote of, when at war with his 
family, 117-118 

Anecdote of, when in Russia, 116 

Attendants (slave boys), 108-110 

Attitude towards moullahs, 269 

Attitude towards working mines, 
261, 305 

Aversion to railways, 305 

Burial, 130 

Character, 117, 118 

Conduct at festivals, 207 

Customs, 105, 106 

Death, 126 

Deserted during earthquake, 256 

Doctor and medicine, 104 

Drinking-water, 104 

Favourites, 124 

Fled from cholera to Paghman, 162, 
200 

Fond of flowers, 107 

Food, 103 

Government, 98 seq., 102 

Guard, 105 

Hat with diamond star, 133 

Imported Russian spy system, 151 

Interest in trade and mechanics, 
229, 233 



Abdur Rahman, Amir continued 
Method of putting down robbery, 

28 

Offence of writing reports concern- 
ing him to the Indian Govern- 
ment, 152 

On Afridi rising, 110-112 
On English Parliament, 114 
Palaces, 51-52, 102 
Personal appearance, 37 
Petitions to, 138 
Plans for his country, 113, 117, 

304 
Policy of getting rid of influential 

men, 289 seq. 
Policy towards England, 110, 113 

seq., 123, 208 

Preparations for fighting or travel- 
ling, 104 
Punishments, 157 seq., 162 seq. t 

170, 300 
Reads letter from spy in Russia to 

author, 303 

Reception of author, 38 
Reception of Nasrullah Khan, 

32 
Sons, his treatment of them, 120, 

121, 293 

Stays at Nasrullah's house, 121 
Story of Moullah and, 15 
Subjugated the Hazaras and Kafris, 

63 

Sufferings from gout, 108, 125 
Title, "Light of Religion and 
Faith," 123, 133 



3 2 3 



Index 



Abdur Rahman, Amir continued Author 



Tomb prepared at Kila Asham 
Khan, 129 

Views on Boer War, 115 
Afghanistan 

As a buffer state, 298 

Condition of country for warfare, 
226 

Difficult to enter, 308 
Afghans 

Admire fat men, 89 

Characteristics, 61, 62, 65 seq., 78, 
92, 100, 138, 227, 276 

Colony in Australia, 283, 284 

Complexion, 61 

Discontented, 298 

Family feuds, 66 

Fond of children, 184 

Lost tribes of Israel and, 62 

Mode of meeting friends, 6 

Policy of arming, 300 

Religious fanatics, 288 

Sympathy with English justice and 
government, 301 

Workman, 235 
Afridi rising, 110 
Aminoolah, Sirdar, 110, 120 
Amirs 

Internal policy, 307 

Powers and duties, 98 
Amusements, 68, 205 
Animals, clean and unclean, 284 
Apricots, 239 

Arabic, children taught to read, 65 
Arak fortified palace, 36 

Abdur Rahman's body taken to, 
128 

Described, 51, 52 
Army, 299 

As a fighting machine, 225-227 

Generals have no knowledge of 

modern warfare, 225 
Asman Heights, 162, 164 

Water-marked, 259 
Astrologers, 84 



Accompanies Shahzada to Kabul, 2 
Appointment and work as engineer, 

231-233 
Assaying and reporting on minerals, 

262 

Attacked by Ghazis, 181 
Exhibition of cinematograph, 141 
First visit to Kabul, 1889, 166 
Hindustani servant, 187 
House and garden in Kabul, 177 
Illness at Kandahar, 19 
Inspects powder-shop, 183 
Journey from Kabul to Peshawar, 

308 seq. 
On jury, 208 

Presents from princes, 196 
Quarters at Kabul, 33, 41 
Quarters at Kandahar, 14 
Received by Amir, 35, 36 seq. 
Ride from Kabul to Peshawar, 11, 

309 seq. 

Riding and cycling, 176 
Shooting on chamans, 175 
Story of servants' superstition, 78 
Ayoob Khan, 112, 293 



B 



Baber, summer palace at, 52 
Baghibala palace, 52, 107 

Abdur Rahman dies in, 127 
Bala Hisar, Kabul, raised to the 

ground, 303 
Bala Hisar, well in, 149 
Barikab, 311, 314 
Barracks, 219 
Basawal, 316 

Bazars, buying in, 190, 192 seq. 
Bazars, lawlessness in, 192 
Beating with sticks, 160 
Blizzard, 312 
Blue pigeon, 174, 176 
Boer war, 115 



324 



Index 



Boistan serai palace, 36, 52 
Abdul Rahman, buried in, 130 
Audience chamber in, 38 

Bribery, 100 

British Agent in Kabul, 301 

Brown, General Sir J., meets Shah- 
zada at Chaman, 1 

Budkhark, 311 

Burial of household treasure, 129 

Buying in bazar, 190, 192 seq. 



C 



Camel meat, 88 

Camels, ill-adapted for travelling over 

snow, 24 

Camps, description of, 8 
Caravans, 242 
Carpets, 240 
Carriers for hire, 195 
Cattle-breeding, 240 
Cavagnari massacred, 303 
Chaman railway terminus near 

Afghan frontier, 1 
Chamans, 174 
Character of people, 64 seq. 
Children, method of naming, 286 
Children singing prayers on roof to 

avert calamity, 86 
Chillum described, 89 
Cholera epidemics, 45, 55, 87, 137, 

162, 199, 200 
Climate of Kabul, 53 seq. 
Cloth manufactured, 240 
Coal, 260, 263-264 
Coinage and mint, 251 
Cold and snow, 23, 25, 54 
Copper ores, 260 
Court jester, 108,207 
Courtship and marriage, 92 seq. 
Cows, 194 

Curios, Hindoo dealers and, 206 
Curzon, Lord, requests Amu: to visit 

him in Peshawar, 296 



Daka, Afghan frontier post, 3161 
Daly, Mrs., lady doctor, 130, 182, 185 

Not allowed to visit the Queen 
Sultana, 295 

Treating cholera cases, 200 
Dances, 72 
Dancing-girls, 71 
Darwaza Ghazni pass, 29 
Death penalty, 98 
Debt collecting, 250 
Deh Afghanan, 35, 177 
Dogs, 27, 46, 285 
Donkeys, small size of, 14 
Dress of men, 58 
Drills, 214 

Duck-shooting, 108, 175 
Durbars, 99, 100, 105, 123 

On festivals, 206 
Durrah-i-Yusef, coal at, 263 
Dust storms, 54 



E 



Earthquakes, 255 seq. 
Elephant, story of mad, 139 
Englishmen dining with Amir, 103 
Europeans in Kabul, 123, 130, 173 
seq. 

Attend durbar on festivals, 206 

Laws and, 208 

Women and children, 184 
Evil eye, the, 86 
Execution, methods of, 168 
Exports, 239 



Fairies, 80 
Fakirs, 271, 273 
False reporting, 153 
Famine of 1903, 197 



325 



Index 



"Fanah" (wedge) torture, 153-155, 

248 

Fanatics (ghazis), 181 
Fat men, 89 
Fatehabad, 311 
Festivals, 279-281 
Firman, 185 
Fish in Kabul river, 175 
Fishing in rivers, method of, 17 
Fleischer family, 130 
Fleischer, Mr., murdered, 175 
Fleischer, Mrs., her German nurse, 

185 

Flour, price of, 194 
Food, 87-89, 194-195 

Lawful and unlawful, 284 
Fowls, duck, geese, etc., raising, 194 
Freight-carrying, 242 
Fruit, dried, 239 
Fuel in Government workshops, 230, 

234, 263, 264 
Funerals, 96-97 



Games, 76 

Gandamak, 311 

Geology of country, 254 seq. 

Ghazni, 23, 29 ; described, 24 

Ghulam Hyder, 289 

Girdi Kutch, 316 

Girls become " purdah " about eight, 

77 

Gold, 260 

Gold mine, an abandoned, 20 
Government, 98, 101 
Government stores, 102 
Governors of Kandahar, 13 
Grapes, 239 
Gravestones, 96-97 
Guards given to European servants 

of Government, 181 
Gulistan serai, Queen Sultana's 

palace, 36, 52, 128 



Habibullah Khan, Amir, 30, 31, 120 

Acknowledged Amir, 127 

Amusements, 139-141 

Attendants, 109 

Attitude towards fakirs, 273 

Attitude towards moullahs, 270 

Characteristics, 141, 207 

Conduct on Abdur Rahman's 
death, 127 seq., 294 

Coronation, 132-134 

Desires seaboard, 306 

Disallowed petitions, 138 

Forms a parliament, 124 

In Arak, 137, 294 

Interest in machinery, 230 

Nominal head of army, 121 

Position difficult, 298 

Precautions regarding his food 
and drink, 104 

Promises of reform, 137 

Remains in Arak during cholera 
epidemic, 201 

Speech at coronation, 133-134 

Story of his cruelty, 161 
Haddah moullah, 110-112 
Hafiz, 273 

Haj, pilgrimages to Mecca, 281 
Hamams (Turkish baths) described, 34 
Hamilton, Lieutenant, 225 
Hazaras, 63 

Coolies, 186 

Mulberry diet, 87 
Servants, 190 

Heat during summer months, 320 
Hindeki, summer palace at, 52 

Amir Habibullah at, 297 
Hindu dealers and curios, 206 

Money-lenders in Kabul, 251 
Hindustani servants and swindling, 

187 seq. 

Holidays, how spent, 69 
Horse raising, 240 
Houses of Kabul described, 50 



326 



Index 



Ignorance of numbers and telling the 

time, 92 
Imports, 244 
Insurrection expected on death of 

Abdur Rahman, 128, 131, 135, 295 
Interpreters, 211 
Irrigation, 13, 42, 241 



Jagdalak, 311 
Jelalabad, 311 

Described, 315, 317 

District, tropical fruits in, 239 

Governor of, 112 

To Khyber, country between, 320 

To Peshawar, five days' journey, 

316 

Jidrani knife-dancers, 72 
Jihad (religious war), 112, 203, 226, 

267, 269, 299 

" Jubah," account of, 73 seq. 
Jumrood fort, 316 



K 



Kabob, 88, 103 
Kabul- 
Bazar shops, 49 
British agent in, 301 
Climate, 53 seq. 

Adapted for fruit-growing, 239 
Description of city and country 

round, 42 seq. 
Houses described, 50 
Kotwali and soldier guards, 145 
Kotwali office, 143 
Mihman Khana, or guest-house, 

33 

Palaces, 51 
People met in streets, 36 



Kabul continued 

Prisons in, 146 seq. 

Bobberies in, 47, 144 

Russian influence in, 297 

To Peshawar, eight days' journey, 
309 

"Wardi" sounded, 49 

Workshops, 234 
Kabul river, 42 

At Jelalabad, 316, 319 
Kabul valley, crater of ancient vol- 
cano, 254 

Once a lake, 258 
Kabulis, characteristics, 61, 62, 66, 

78 
Kabulis, consume large quantities of 

tea, 89 
Kafris, 63 

Boys punished for deserting, 167 
Kandahar 

Described, 13, 14 

District tropical fruits in, 239 

Nasrullah Khan's stay at, 12 seq. 
Kandaharis, characteristics, 63 
Khilat, 22, 29 

' Khilat," robes of honour, 134 
Khuskh, Russian railway to, 114 
Khyber Pass closed, 196 
Khyber Pass, opened twice a week 

for travellers, 314 
Kila Durani, 29 

Kila Hasham Khan, summer palace 
of Queen Sultana at, 52 

Abdur Rahman's tomb prepared at, 

129 

Kila Kazee, 30 
Knife -dancers, 72 
Kohistan, earthquakes in, 257 
Koochee people, 88 

As carriers, 242 

Women, 243 
Koran, account of, 268 
Kotwal (magistrate), 138, 142 seq. 

At Chaman terminus, story of, 6 

Duties of, 47 



327 



Index 



Kotwali sepoys (policemen), 48, 143 

seq. 

Thieving propensities, 178-180. 
Kotwali stations, 145 
" Kro," the unit of distance, 10, 245 
Kuzilbash people, 266 



Ladysmith, defence of, 119 
Languages of Afghanistan, 63-64 
Latabund Pass, 310, 314 
Letter-writers in bazars, 50 
Letters, 209 

How carried, 210 

Postage, 211 

Loneliness of life in Kabul, 173 
Lunatics, 271 
Lundi Kotal, British frontier post, 

316, 322 



M 



Mahomed Ali, Sirdar, 120 

Mahomed Omar, Sirdar, 30, 110, 

120, 126, 133, 294 
Acknowledges Habibullah as Amir, 
127 

Mahomedzai family, allowance from 
Government, 122 

Mahommedan belief on true reli- 
gions, 202 

Marches, length of, 10, 25 

Marriage customs, 94-95 

Maulavi Najmudeen Aghondzada, 
Haddah moullah, 110-112 

Melons, 317 

Mills for grinding corn, 241 

Mines, not worked, 261, 305 

Mines, out-cropping, 260 

Mirzas (clerks), 245 seq. 

Moullahs 

Influence and practices, 135, 267, 
274 



Moullahs continued 

Preaching a new religion, 202 
Story of Amir and, 15 

Mukur, 22, 23 

Mulberry diet, 87 

Munzil Bagh, 19 

Musak, for carrying water and cross- 
ing rivers described, 318 

Musical instruments, 70 
At Kandahar, 22 

Musjids, 277 

Mussulman year, how reckoned, 279 



N 



Nasrullah Khan, Shahzada, 40, 120 
Builds house like Dorchester 

House, 121 
Conduct on Abdur Rahman's 

death, 126, 128, 133 
Entry into Kabul, 31 
Favourite wife dies of cholera, 201 
Head of offices and mirzas, 121 
Inspecting troops, 136 
Journey from Chaman to Kabul, 

2 seq. 

Knowledge of his religion, 203 
Mission to England, its object, 110 
Routes from and to Kabul, 12 
Stay in Kandahar, 12, 21 
Visit to England, 1895... 1 
Welcomed at villages and cities, 

5, 11, 24 







Officers, titles, and promotion, 223 
Officials, 99, 101, 103, 109 

Power over Abdur Rahman, 125 

Princes and, 121 

Salaries, 122 

Titles, 123 

328 



Index 



Officials con tinned 

Treatment of English residents, 123 

Workmen and, 236 
Old uniforms, 60 
'Oud Khels, thief tribe, 221-223 
Oxus river, gold in, 260 



Pack animals, 4, 242, 320 
Paghman, summer palace at, 52 

Abdur Rahman at, 162 
Palaces in Kabul, 51 
Parliament, 124 

Persian, the Court language, 64 
Petitions to Amir, 138 
Pilau, 88, 103 
Plots to get Abdur Rahman's body, 

129 

Political situation, 289 seq. 
Postage on letters and magazines, 211 
Powder-making, accidents in, 237 
Prayers, 276 
Princes, Royal, their position and 

treatment, 120-122 
Prisons, 302 

In Kabul, 146 seq. 

Well in Bala Hisar, 149 
Prisoners : food and treatment, 148- 

150 

Prisoners, revolt of, 147 
Provisions from India, 194 
Pul-i-Bagrami, Amir's shooting-box 

at, 139 

Punishments, 149 seq., 157 seq. 
Pushtoo, 63 



Quail-shooting, 174, 176 
Queen Sultana, 30 

Influence, 126 

Lived at Gulistan serai, 294 



Racing, 75 

Rafts for crossing river, 317 
Railways, why not wanted, 305 
Railways would be easy to make in 

Afganistan, 29 
Ramazan fast, 277 
Regimental bands, 223, 224 
Regiments, how named, 220 
Religion, 266 seq. 

Crimes and offences, 274 
Revenue of country, 296 
Road from Chaman to Kandahar, 

29 

Robberies 

And murders on roads, 27 
By collectors of revenue, 123 
In Kabul, 47, 144 
Roberts, Lord, march to Kandahar, 

113, 114 
Roberts, Lord, rased Bala Hisar, 

303 
Roofs of houses used for exercise and 

sleeping, 205 
Route to Kabul through Khilat, 

Mukur, and Ghazni, 22 
Routes from India to Afghanistan, 12 
Rupees, 252 
Russian encroachments on frontier, 

297 

Russian influence in Kabul, 297 
Russian railway to Khuskh, 114 



" Sandelee," for warming rooms, de- 
scribed, 90 
Sayids, 272 
Schools, 64 
Seaboard desired, 306 
Serais, 312 

Servants in Kabul, 186 
Shahrara palace, 52 



3 2 9 



Index 



Shaitons (demons), stories of, 81 seq. 

Sheep raising, 194 

Shere All, Amir, story of chief of 

'Oud Khels and, 221 
Shiah sect, 266 
Shinwari tribe, 112 
Shooting near Kabul, 174 
Silk, where produced, 240 
Singing, 70 
Sirdar, title conferred only on Amir's 

sons, 30 
Smoking, 89 
Snipe- shooting, 175 
Snuff-taking, 90 
Soldiers 

And arms, 213 seq. 

Dress, 59, 213 

Field-cooking utensils, 219 

Guards, 3, 145 

Length of service, 219 

Medals, 218 

Mode of life, 220 

Pay, 218, increased, 136 

Qualities, 225 

Ready to revolt on Abdur Rah- 
man's death, 131, 135-137, 295 

Uniforms, 216 

Spies, favourite accusation of, 152 
Spies in foreign countries, 303, 306 
Sponges, legend about, 84 
Spy system, 99, 151 

Abolished, 134 
Stealing, punishment for, 166 
Story-tellers, 75 ; 
Sundials, 91 
Sum sect, 266 

Superstition, stories of, 78 seq. 
Swordstick combats, 73 



Tea imported, 244 
Timber, 240, 317 
Time, how kept, 91-92 
Tirah campaign, 300 

Its effect on traffic, 196 
Tobacco, 89 
Tortures, 153 seq., 302 
Trade and commerce, 229 seq. 
Treasury, public and private, 101 
Turkestanis, 63 



U 



Usbeg game of " Buz-bazee," 315 
Usbeg Lancers, 3 
Usbegs, 63 

W 

Warming rooms, method of, 90 

Weddings of different classes, 94-95 

Weights and measures, 245 

White, General, defence of Lady- 
smith, 119 

Wives, plurality of, 287 

Working hours, 205 

Workmen, foreman and, 236 
Pay of, 238 

Workshops, 229 seq., 234 

Women, laws of "purdah" sus- 
pended in time of war, 227 

Women, not valued in Kabul, 198 

Wrestling matches, 74 



Yakoob Khan, 112, 293 



THE END 



PBINTED BT WILLIAM CLOWES ASD SONS, LIMITED, LONDON AND BECCLF3. 



The Dawn in Russia. 

By H. W. NEVINSON. 

Demy 8v0. 7s. 6d. net (post free yj. lid.). 

Illustrated by suppressed Revolutionary Cartoons. 

"None of the numberless books on Russia has given anything like 
such a vivid impression of the country at this supreme crisis." Truth. 

"A brilliant book vivid and convincing. A most comprehensive 
survey of recent history." Tribune. 

"A brilliant book. It should open the eyes of all to the signifi- 
cance of the tremendous event which is in progress in Russia." The 
Speaker. 

" The finest book about Russia ever written." Sunday Sun. 



In the Uttermost East. 

Being an Account of Investigations among the Natives 
and Russian Convicts of the Island of Sakhalin, with 
Notes of Travel in Japan, Korea, Siberia, and 
Manchuria. 

By CHARLES H. HAWES. 

With 70 Illustrations and 3 Maps. Detny Sv0, cloth extra. 16s. 

"Unusually interesting and finely illustrated." Daily Telegraph. 
" Uncommonly well written." Standard. 



Siberia 

and the Exile System. 

By GEORGE KENNAN. 

Profusely Illustrated. 
Two vols. Demy 8vo, cloth extra, gilt tops. 32s. 

"A copious, authentic, and very striking record. Contains the 
most satisfactory description of Siberia which has yet been written in 
English." The Times. 

HARPER & BROTHERS, 45, ALBEMARLE ST., LONDON, W. 



Sporting Trips of a 
Subaltern. 

By CAPTAIN B. R. M. GLOSSOP. 

Profusely Illustrated, demy Sw., 10s. 6d. 

" Here we have the book of a famous big-game shot in which sim- 
plicity and even naivete are the primary note. . . . One can read of the 
hunting of nearly all the sorts of game. . . . Illustrated with the best 
photographs we have seen." Standard. 



A Modern Slavery. 

The Present Slave Trade in Portuguese W. Africa. 
By H. W. NEVINSON. 

Demy Bvo. Illustrated. Price. 6s. 

A thrilling story of Mr. Nevinson's expedition to the heart of the 
slave trade country, and the revelations which are now receiving the 
attention of the British Government. 



'Twixt Sirdar and Menelik. 

An Account of a Year's Expedition from Zeila to Cairo 
through unknown Abyssinia. 

By the late CAPTAIN M. S. WELLBY 

(i8th Hussars). 
Very Fully Illustrated. Deniy Svo, cloth extra. 16s. 

"The description of the practically unknown country through which 
the traveller passed . . . the curious account of the ' devil workers ' of 
Walamo, and the Theory of the Shangkallas, that the white men are 
born of thunder and can cause rain, are full of interest. The book, 
indeed, is full of interest from many points of view, and is so brightly 
written that it might be read as a mere tale of adventure." Athenaeum. 



HARPER & BROTHERS, 45, ALBEMARLE ST., LONDON, W. 



KETURN TO 



USE 

WHICH BORROWED 



LOAN DEPT. 



Renewed books are subject 

REC'D LD 




LD 2lA-50m-8, r 57 
(C8481slO)476B 



General Library . 
University of California 
Berkeley 



YC 38579 









877951 






THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY 



